Redemption
by Silverstreams
Summary: After Caroline discovers her 'parents' to be Black Mesa spies, Doug Rattmann hides young Chell in Old Aperture before she's sealed off and presumed dead. Years later, she's back, and her resurfacing could lead to Aperture's downfall. A Portal prequel about what it truly takes to have a shot at redemption.
1. Chapter 1

Summer 1996

The water of the lake was cold on her feet.

Eleven-year-old Chell splashed around in the choppy waves of Lake Michigan, though she didn't venture in past her knees. A gray sky hung overhead, and a cool wind picked up moisture from the turbulent lake. Wave after wave crashed against her.

Chell pulled her arms around her chest, shivering in her blue and white swimsuit. The wind grew colder by the minute, and she was about ready to get changed out of her damp swimsuit and back into the car with her mother.

It had been Chell's idea to take an hour's detour to visit the great lake on their way to upper Michigan. She wanted this to be one last moment to share before she split ways with her mother. She'd hoped for warm waters and sunny skies, and perhaps her mother swimming as well. But this wasn't a tropical beach. It was Michigan.

Chell was alone. Her mom sat beneath the cover of a few trees. Her long sleeved shirt was bright against the gray atmosphere, and her hair was pulled into a tight bun. Books and papers sat scattered beside her—something science related, no doubt. With her Black Mesa interview days away, she spent all of her time studying.

A strong gust of wind picked up, slapping Chell with cold waves and fluttering her mom's papers. The girl's body trembled, and her skin rose with chills. She turned and clamored through the reeds and rocks, up the half-muddy half-sandy slope to her mother

She stood there for a moment, shivering, before she glanced up.

"Had enough?" her mother said. Chell nodded. Her mother pulled a beach towel and dry clothes from a bag.

"Go change," she said. "I'll meet you at the car."

Chell nodded, pulling the towel around her shoulders. She tucked the clothes under her arm and headed to the beach's bathroom, patting her legs dry. Her dark hair was still damp against her bare shoulders, and she ran back to their grungy white car.

As they pulled away, Chell watched the frothy waters, still sliding through the reeds and she knew that her last attempt to make a worthy memory had failed.

Her mother glanced in the rear-view mirror once in awhile, noticing how her daughter still clung to the damp beach towel and stared out the window.

"Need me to turn the heat on back there?" she said.

Chell shook her head.

Her mother drummed her fingertips against the steering wheel. Field after field sped by her window as they drove through the dog-shaped state.

The woman glanced in the mirror and tried again.

"Everything all right back there?" Chell did not look away from the window. There was a pause—a long pause that her mother didn't comment on—until finally Chell nodded yes.

"Good," said her mother. "We're almost there."

They pulled into the small town of Appleton as the sun set in the orange sky. The town felt empty. Next to no one was out and about, yet the stores and gas stations remained open. After a few intersections, they turned to find street after street of houses. There seemed to be about three separate designs in all—with all three alternating up and down the streets. Chell looked into their windows, expecting to see light and people. There was only darkness. The town's people must have been elsewhere.

On the edge of the street, one bright house stood like a beacon. They pulled into the driveway, gravel crunching beneath the tires. Her mother shut off the engine and turned to face her daughter, hand resting on the seat's edge. Chell stared at her golden bracelet.

"Well," she said. "Time to go meet your new family."

Chell said nothing. Instead, she slipped on her shoes and gathered some of her things into a nondescript backpack.

A dark-haired lady answered the door, face brightening when she saw the two. "Judith!" she said, ushering them in.

Chell hovered near one of the couches, looking around the place that would soon become her home. It most certainly didn't feel like the home she'd come from, which was a small apartment they'd rented while her mother finished her degree.

A layer of dust sat upon everything. The furnishings and the decorations all seemed plain and cookie cutter. She guessed that the houses along this street had similar, if not identical, décor.

A man with equally dark hair—though missing a fair portion on top-walked around the corner. "So you're the one I've heard so much about," he said. "Nice to finally meet you, Judith Mossman."

Chell's mother smiled, reaching out to shake his hand. He pulled her into a hug, but she pulled away. "And you must be Rochelle," he said, looking over at the girl.

"Chell," said the girl. She fingered at the straps of her backpack and stared at the carpeting.

"Okay then. It's nice to meet you, Chell."

For a long moment she studied the couple officially adopting her.

The lady placed her hand on the girl's shoulder. "I know your mother probably told you all about us, but it's good for formal introductions. I'm Emily Naransky, and this is my husband, Jerry."

Chell nodded. She had indeed heard everything about them—or at least everything she would need to know to pass as their adopted daughter. She certainly looked the part—they shared her dark hair and stoic looks.

Emily motioned for them to take a seat, and Judith pulled out the official papers—all previously finalized, of course—that transferred custody of her daughter to this couple of scientists.

After that was done, they drifted into small talk. Chell silently observed.

"So Emily's told me that you went back to school," said Jerry.

Judith nodded. "It's nice to finally be an official researcher," she said. "I might finally get that job at Black Mesa." She added, "I'm headed down there after this for an interview."

Emily congratulated her, and Jerry gave her a pat on the back. "It'll be nice to be co-workers, " he said.

Mossman nodded. "Though I wouldn't want your job," she said with a short laugh.

Emily laughed, shaking her head. "It's not that bad. Those guys at Aperture are a joke. There's enough of us Black Mesas in there—you'd think they could sniff out a rat."

"Spying on them is the easiest job you could ask for," Jerry pitched in.

"I'd think it would be a little difficult, though," said Judith Mossman. Worry crept into her voice. She didn't want to hear that her plan to adopt out her daughter as another spy for Black Mesa was pointless. If this didn't land her a job at the country's number one applied science company, she didn't know what would.

"Oh no," said Emily. "Information's easy to get—it's just getting the details and the access to the technology that's hard."

"We have to work," Jerry said, " so we can't wait around and eavesdrop for those kinds of things. And that's where you come in," he said, pointing to Chell, who was still absently staring around the room. She glanced up.

"You will be perfect."

* * *

A/N:

This is going to be a full-out Portal prequel, covering everything from Caroline's upload into GLaDOS to Doug's original journey through the testing track. It might take a while to get into the main plot of the point, but I can assure you that the earlier stuff _matters._

I plan to stick to canon as closely as I possibly can (for instance, Emily's name comes from the test subject list in Lab Rat) but will deviate when absolutely necessary.


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter 2

The elevator dinged.

Before they parted, Emily pulled Chell into a hug. Her status of 'mother' was still new and uncommon amongst her co-workers-she showed it off whenever she could. And the few employees that had kids kept them as far away from Aperture as they possibly could.

Chell said nothing, receiving the hug for a brief moment before pulling away.

Left. Right. A catwalk, and another left. The path felt familiar beneath her feet—as if a line had been drawn for her through the maze of Aperture. Her twice-daily walk to and from the Employee Daycare Center never varied. The idea of taking a wrong turn and getting hopelessly lost terrified her into memorizing the layout.  
Chell visualized a map, checking off each turn until she hit the last hallway. The door creaked open, and she hit the lights and flooded the dark, musty room.

Empty. As usual.

The clock's tick echoed, a bitter reminder of just how early it was. She rubbed her eyes.  
This morning, Emily's observation team received a new test subject. Her excitement—and the potential usefulness of the results for Black Mesa—made her unable to sleep, so she woke Chell up before she left for work. This behavior was normal—like all Aperture employees, she had a twenty-four hour dedication to her job. Normal hours meant nothing.

A computer monitor flared to life as Chell clicked a button. While waiting, she spun her desk chair in circles. An unlucky employee would show up. Eventually. Aperture was too cheap to hire someone to run the place, so they passed the duty, hot-potato style, amongst themselves. No one was exempt—even Ms. Caroline came down one day.

Chell kicked her feet against the desk, propelling herself in endless circles. Blur, screen, blur, computer, blur, cabinet. A smear of black and white caught her attention as Doug Rattmann poked through the door.

A few papers drifted to the floor from the desk, caught up in the twirling air currents. "Dizzy yet?" he said, eyes throwing off a wild-eyed look.

Chell stuck out a hand to grab the desk, abruptly stopping herself. Her vision spun, twisting and tilting before settling. She dug her fingers into the chair's back and shrugged. He hit a few keys on her computer, then surveyed the room.

Rows of desks. Projector. Filing cabinets. An _abundance _of fun for a recently-turned twelve year old girl. She could've stayed home in Appleton, the employee town for the mines that'd been transformed into the employee town for Aperture Laboratories.

Being here was Chell's job. She had to stay and gather as much information as possible—anything to help her mom get that job.

"Not much to do here," he said. The man introduced himself as Doug, though his nametag said Rattmann.

Chell shrugged. Rattmann ran a hand through his hair.

"What do you normally do?" he asked.

"Computer stuff," she said with a half-shrug. Doug stared at the sparse screen.

"I used to be a programmer," he said, typing for a moment and scrolling through a bit of his work. He lifted a finger off of the mouse, ready to launch into detail about Aperture computers. Chell watched intently.

"You know what," said Doug as he clicked off the computer's power. "Better idea. Follow me."

Chell hopped down and followed Doug through unfamiliar hallways until a crossroads blocked their way. Faded lettering blended with a concrete wall, with only a portion recently painted.

"They send the painting projects to me," said Doug. "And there's tons of them. Help me with this, and I'll give you an art lesson or two afterwards."

"I'm not very good," said Chell, drifting to the wall where a small gray and pink cube sat. Her fingers trailed over raised edges, hovering over a glowing heart.

"Go on," he said. "Press it."

Chell pushed and the middle sunk in. The cube's top split, retracting into each raised corner. Inside the modified weighted storage cube, a burst of color greeted her.

Brushes and paints and books spilled out of the half-sized container. Doug pulled out a few splattered brushes and paints, handing them to Chell.He hit another raised heart on the cube's side, and the top clicked closed. He pushed it back against the wall, providing a perfect step up for Chell.

"You're here everyday?" he asked, painting in the beginnings of a word.

Chell nodded grimly, dipping her brush into the yellow paint. An infallible focus guided her strokes. Chell dipped her brush into the yellow paint, focusing on fitting in the letters perfectly.

"That's okay," he said. "Me too."

She gave a little snort, wiping away a drop of paint from her arm.

"You must love your job." She asked this question to each employee she met—and most didn't hesitate to agree with her. Doug gave the hallway a sweeping glance before grimacing.

"Well, my current job's better than programming," he said. Chell's silence urged him on. "I fix the broken ashpods." Chell's face flickered in confusion, and he added, "ASHPD. Portal Gun."

"The ones you're testing?" she said, brush slowing. Though she'd never seen one, her mom worked in test observation. She helped design test chambers, yet rarely worked with the device itself.

"That's right," said Doug, gathering his palette and paints. The word 'offices' accompanied by an arrow stared back at him, wet paint shining. He wiped off his brushes with today's lab coat. "My job's to improve it."

Chell hopped down from the cube. "I've never seen one up close," she said.

Doug reached for a thick book —a dark hardback with a white wave splashed across the front. "How about this. Since taking you on the job worked out well, I'll come back in a few days and show you the ASHPD in my lab," said Doug.

"For now," he said, tossing her a fresh brush. "Time for an art lesson."

* * *

Three days later, Doug Rattmann returned as a designated daycare giver. A trend of dragging Chell along on the job quickly developed. She delivered office messages and stapled papers. She observed testing. In the announcement development room, she helped devise official instructions to air during various catastrophes.

Out of them all, she liked Doug —thoughtful and artistic—so unlike other loudmouthed men and women.

Chell sat in the daycare center with a stack of paintings. She rubbed her hands, cracked with dried paint, and leaned her latest painting against a monitor. Again, she was early—and today, she was determined to repaint this picture until she made one good enough to send to her mom in New Mexico.

Like Doug told her, she focused on shape and color. She tried to feel the art rather than strive for realism or accuracy, but the pictures of the lake turned out too bland and lifeless every time.

Footsteps.

Doug walked in, waving her over.

"I can't leave the lab today," he said. Chell set her paintbrush down, not caring that the drying paint would cement it to the paper. "Leave that. Let's go."

* * *

His lab was empty and clean, save for the equipment in various stages of disassembly. Black claws sat on his table, along with a gun-like weapon. A few small cubes, like Doug's, sat stacked on a counter.

Doug disappeared behind shelving and reappeared with a sleek white gun. He set it onto the table, dragging over the three claws and a handful of tools. Chell ran a hand across the gun's smooth outer shell.

"It works?" she said.

"Not yet," said Doug. He glanced around, quickly remembering that his lab contained no portal-conductive surfaces. "It's a prototype. Subjects have difficulties carrying the gun _and_ carrying a cube— they keep dropping and breaking the ASHPD."

He sighed. "This other prototype—an energy manipulator—has been collecting dust. I thought I'd try combining the two."

Chell looked over at the experimental gun—similar to the portal device, but with three black claws and a more square body.

"Can I try?"

"Sure," said Doug. "Lift something with the gravity gun and I'll lift something else with this one." He tapped the portal device, then adjusted the top claw before flicking it on.

The prototype gun weighed heavily in Chell's hands. She pulled the trigger, lifting a deactivated turret. A smile sprouted across her face. The gun's glowing field of energy lifted it up as if with invisible strings.

"How does it work?" she said, lifting and lowering the turret. Doug raised another turret, which briefly hovered before crashing to the ground. He sighed and readjusted the claws.

"Yours is a zero-point energy field manipulator—the ASHPD version's designed for lifting cubes and turrets. The gun's core powers it—that thing's got as much power as a miniature black hole."

Chell gently set the turret down and pulled the gun to her chest. "I love it," she said. Doug nodded in agreement.

"Me too," he said, nodding in agreement. "My reassignment was like a promotion." Chell gave one last wistful sigh before returning the device to Doug.

While he tinkered, she scoured the shelving until she found pencils and blank sheets of paper. She pushed up a chair beside the energy manipulator and drew the piece of technology messily and expressively.

She tried again. With each attempt her realism improved.

Doug blinked and pushed his chair away, metal legs squeaking against tiled floor. His hour-long concentration broken, he looked at Chell's drawings before rummaging through cabinets until he found a small stack of oversized papers.

"Want some blueprints?" he said. "Sometimes it helps to draw the individual parts."

Chell's heart quickened as she thumbed through the crisp lines and fine-print notes. Her fingers trembled as she smoothed them out.

"Thanks," she said—quickly, softly, as to not reveal her excitement. She pulled out another paper, drawing a grid before copying the blueprints in detail. She didn't risk copying the fine print—she read it again and again while she drew, committing parts of it to memory.

By the end of the day, she copied them all.

* * *

Chell stared at the telephone. A crumpled piece of paper unfurled in her hand—her mother's current number. She inhaled and dialed the number, biting her lip as it rang and rang. Her feet bounced, barely able to contain her excitement.

A telltale click. The other end picked up.

"Hello?" an annoyed voice answered. Chell had probably interrupted something science-y.

"Mom!" she said, a rare show of energy busting out.

"Oh," said Mossman. "Hello Chell." A beat of silence. "Is something wrong?"

"No, but I've got _really_ good news."

Chell's mother exhaled. "I'm busy right now—Black Mesa could call any minute now. "For days, she'd remained in the queue of potential hires without any other news. "Can it wait?"

"It's important," said Chell, cupping her hand around the mouthpiece. In the other room, her adoptive parents sat at their respective desks, each doing something work-related. They had to keep up with their co-workers' levels of dedication, after all.

"Then say it," she said. Chell shook her head, her action invisible through the telephone lines.

"Not over the phone," she said, voice low and serious. "But I bet you could get the job."

A shuffle on the other end. A pause. When Mossman spoke, she used an upbeat yet hurried voice. "Go tell your new mom and dad. They'll get the message to me," said Mossman. She cleared her throat. "Goodbye, Chell." she said.

"Mom?" A click on the other end. "Mom, I lo—"

The dial tone cut her off.

* * *

Chell stood at the end of Jerry's desk, unsure of how to start this conversation.

He scribbled in a notebook before glancing up and jumping. "You're so quiet," he said. "Didn't see you there. Something wrong?"

She shook her head. "Can you send something to my mom for me?"

"Sure," he said, wheeling around. "What is it?"

Chell pulled out the sketches tucked underneath her arm and set them on the desk. A look of confusion and amazement crossed his face. He flipped through them.

"Where did you get these?" he said.

"Drew them," she said.

"You _drew_ blueprints?" he said. Emily looked up, pushing away her papers before joining them.

"They're copied," said Chell. She stared at the layer of dust that blanketed the furniture and the carpet, and couldn't help but notice that it was the same layer of dust from when she arrived.

"This isn't portal technology," said Emily. She held one up to the light. "I've never seen this before."

Chell reached for the blueprints, but her parents pulled them away.

"These are phenomenal," he said. "Where did you get these?"

"Doug," said Chell. Emily's lips turned up into a smile at the corners.

"Did you memorize the rest?" She meant the words, the details, the instructions littering the real blueprints.

Chell nodded after a moment. The two launched into questions, hammering her left and right for answers. She replied truthfully, spilling out the specific details. When they finished, they moved to flush the girl out of the room. Jerry grabbed a phone.

"So you're calling my mom?" she said, Emily's arm pushing against her back in a not-so-subtle push to the door.

"Hon," she said. "That'll take too long." She gave her a small pat.

"We've got to call Black Mesa. They'll be all over this," said Jerry. He dialed the phone.

"Wait," said Chell, stumbling forward. The door closed behind her and a lock clicked into place.

She leaned against the door, sliding down until she sat with her back against it. She listened. Excited murmurs drifted from the other side.

Somehow, she knew she wasn't going to get any credit for the blueprints.

And neither was Judith Mossman.

* * *

A/N

Thank you for reading! I really appreciate everyone that's followed and reviewed this so far c:

I'll try and get chapters up as often as I can—at least once every two weeks!


	3. Chapter 3

Chapter 3

The phone rang.

Chell lounged between Emily and Jerry on the couch. The TV murmured, broadcasting into the summer evening. The sun hung low in the hazy sky, and the chill of night began to creep in. Emily got up and answered the call.

A shout from the other room. Jerry lunged and muted the TV.

"It's Black Mesa," she said as they rushed in, "with news." She hit the speakerphone and an automated voice came through, with a half-finished message.

"-and development will begin immediately on these blueprints. When Jerry and Emily Naransky return to their normal jobs at headquarters, a promotion will be put in place, and a permanent raise has been added to their current salaries. Black Mesa thanks you for your contribution to science."

Emily's hand hovered against her mouth, not believing the news. The computerized message disconnected, leaving them hung in disbelief. Jerry finally gave a holler and attempted tp lift and spin Chell, but he remembered that she was twelve years old rather than a toddler. He staggered with the unexpected weight, and pulled her into a hug instead.

"Couldn't do it without you, kid," said Jerry. Pride surged through her, and all she wanted was to stay there, safe and appreciated and—dare she say loved—within that hug. She closed her eyes and for a fleeting moment, she imagined these two as her family. They pulled apart.

In another room, Emily slid on sandals. She said, "Grab your shoes. We're going out for ice cream."

* * *

They walked through the town's stores and roamed the air-conditioned aisles. Row after row, they stuffed a cart with junk food and cleaning products—it was time to demolish that layer of dust enveloping the house.

Chell stared at the wall of paints.

Her parents, on a whim, told her to choose a color to paint her room. A particular shade of blue stood out to her—almost identical to her eye color.

She glanced through the shelving and saw a black and white blur. Doug. She crouched, hoping he continued browsing the aisle over and paid no attention to her. She pretended to examine the bottom shelf of paint colors.

" Chell!" Emily called, turning the corner. "Pick a color yet?" The girl kept her hands on the lowest shelf, watching Rattmann's reaction. He turned, spotting only Emily through the gaps between cans of paint.

"Which one you looking at?" she said. Chell glared, jabbing a finger at Doug. Emily's face creased in recognition, but the did not move.

"I like this blue," said Chell. Emily frowned.

"That's red." She pointed at the bottom shelf.

"I know. The blue's up there." Chell reached to a higher shelf and plucked up a gallon-container of paint, plopping it in the cart. "Can we get ice cream now?"

"Hold on." Emily picked up the can, liquid sloshing inside.

Doug turned the corner and waved. Emily smiled, but Chell stared at the paint cans, listening.

"Mr. Rattmann, right?" said Emily, straightening. He nodded.

"Out here, it's Doug," he said, thinking about how strange it was to be outside of work, yet feel as if he'd never left at all. "Painting a room?"

"Yeah." Her new mom glanced at the cart, and took notice at the embarrassing amount of brightly packed and unhealthy foods compared to Doug's basket of fresh produce.

"What are you guys up to?" he asked.

"Oh, nothing much. Chell's about to start school in a couple of weeks. We're just getting in all of our summer fun while we can." Her fingers danced across the can's edges, jumping from one to another until her arm extended all the way.

Emily dropped in the can. "We're on out way to grab ice cream. Care to join?"

Doug agreed.

It was only fitting that the man responsible for their celebration should take part it in.

* * *

Chell felt sick to her stomach. Her ice cream sat in her hand, dripping vanilla drops onto her hand like sticky tears. She couldn't focus on her dessert. She couldn't lick it away.

In the cool evening breeze, the four crammed around a table on the ice cream shop's patio. Everyone else ate and enjoyed and conversed until the sun sank beneath the horizon and the store closed down their outdoor umbrellas.

"So I haven't seen you at Aperture recently," said Doug.

"She's been busy," said Emily, giving Chell a sideways glance. The truth was, Chell had been avoiding Aperture and avoiding Doug, because she could not look him in the eye and not feel nauseous for lying and stealing from a man like him. And yet he still did not mind her companionship. He missed her when she was gone.

Jerry laughed. "But we can't keep her away too long."

Chell briefly made eye contact before darting away.

"She'll be back soon enough," said Emily, wrapping an arm around Chell's shoulders. She leaned her head onto her arms, wanting to close her eyes and never open them. "But for now, it's time for us to go back home."

* * *

The next afternoon, she returned.

Doug repaired ASHPDs, fixing them for hours until he got a chance to mess with his prototype. Chell sat her head on the counter, watching and taking notes internally.

"So if you get the energy manipulator working, you won't have to fix guns?"

"Well, at least not as many."

"Then what would you do?"

"I'm sure Aperture would find another ridiculous job for me," he said.

"What do you want to do?"

"I don't know," he said. "I've never been given the chance. To choose."

Doug went back to tinkering, but they heard far-off conversation.

The door pushed in. Jerry walked in with a sack of potatoes over his shoulder. "So this is where you go every day? And you," he said to Doug, "Don't get tired of her?" He looked around, tossing the bag onto the table and rattling the tools. A gun wobbled, and Doug lurched forward to grab it.

"She's no bother," he said with a smile, hand still on the gun. "It's easy to lose yourself in the quiet of this place."

Chell straightened, smiling. The stark white ASHPD caught Jerry's attention—his daughter had never once mentioned that Doug worked with Aperture's bread and butter—he gad assumed he developed prototypes, like the gravity gun. He shot Chell a look but she avoided. She hadn't wanted them to know.

The potatoes loomed at the table's edge. Jerry finally said, "Someone in the cafeteria ordered too many potatoes. We'll be getting nothing but french fries from now on."

"And why are they in my lab?" Doug said, sliding the burlap sack back onto the floor and off of his counter.

"Science project," Jerry said. "Everyone in the daycare center's supposed to do one. Use as many potatoes as you like—you're the only one."

"Can I do something different?" Chell whined, grimacing. The adults paid her no mind.

"Should we take them back to the center, then?" said Doug.

"Great idea," said Jerry, glancing over at Chell. "Here, I'll take this over there." He hefted up the sack. The door hissed closed.

Chell set her head on her arms. "Do you know how to make a potato battery?"

Doug shook his head. "No idea. Can't say that I've ever wanted to, either," he said.

"That's okay," she said. "I made one last year. For class."

* * *

In the daycare center, they found everything she would need for her project—red and blue wires, poster board, and a set of colored pencils.

Doug's hand rested under his chin. "Time to add you to Aperture's 'Science Fair," he said, raising arms in an air-quote.

"What?"

"Haven't seen it?" When she only stared, he led her out of the room wrapping around the corner to get to the cramped hallway. Other projects sat scattered across the hallway, collecting dust.

"One day we'll have enough for a real science fair." A curled up banner sat on a tabletop, abandoned. "Or a Bring Your Daughter to Work Day. That was the original plan."

"Never had one?"

"Not yet, no," he said. "We'll keep collecting these projects u ntil they plan something interesting enough to draw in more kids."

Chell walked up and down the aisle, noting the other potato batteries shoved alongside the edges.

She figured this wasn't the first time that Aperture had over-ordered potatoes.

* * *

As Chell sped through her poster, Doug noticed the girl grow increasingly worried. Her face creased and seemed panicked, but she said nothing. The way her letters scrambled across the page, messy and hurried, was not at all with the same precision she used in art. Yet he knew Chell was a quiet person—if she wanted to talk about it, she would.

A few minutes later, she asked Doug a puzzling question.

"Do you lock your lab?" she said.

"No point," he said "More work. There's nothing important in there."

A pause. Chell fiddled with the ends of her battery. "You should," she said.

* * *

Doug messed with his own battery, built after Chell painstakingly showed him the correct way to make one. As he messed with it, and idea struck him.

"Be right back," he said, darting to the door. "I've got the perfect thing for your project."

Chell looked up and blinked as the man disappeared from the room.

He found himself walking to Henry's lab, even though the man worked with computers and not biology. But unlike him, that scientist might know someone that worked with living things.

"Would you stop messing with that for a minute?" Doug said. Henry was crouched over a table. He didn't look up.

"Always nice to see you, Doug."

"I need something for a potato battery," he said. Henry stretched, running a hand through his balding head.

"Is this for the girl?" he said.

"Yes."

"You know that that isn't normal, right? You being around her all the time."

The scientist looked around Henry's lab, noticing how much brighter and whiter it was im comparison to his own blue-gray walls.

"She helps," he said after a moment. "I don't know what it is about her, but she helps me know what's real."

"Like that cube of yours?" Doug didn't answer. He knew Henry had never liked that cube.

"Look, can you get me something for it or not?" he said. "It needs to have power for a long time." He wanted to ensure that, whenever Aperture did get around to it, Chell's project would still win the fair.

"Then let it take root and grow," he said, throwing up his arms. "She'll be set for years."

"The thing smells. It's not growing anytime soon."

Henry gave a sigh. "I'll find someone to make something for your precious project."

* * *

Doug decided to take the long way back and double check his lab. The way that Chell had spoken earlier—the way she had brought it up out of the blue—made him nervous. Or at least paranoid.

He paused with his hand on the door, listening. Shuffling on the inside. Strange that someone else has stopped by. Doug pushed in the door to see Jerry standing over a portal gun with a handful of papers.

He pushed open the door to see Jerry with a handful of papers, standing over a portal gun.

"Can I help you?"

The other man froze, letting the papers flop down onto the table.

"Oh," said Jerry. "Was looking for you. Emily just sent me up. She wanted to know when her ASHPDs would be working again." He gave a laugh. "She can't test without them," he said, edging toward the door. Rattmann still stood in the doorway.

"Well," he said, crossing his arms. "Tell her to get smarter test subjects that don't break my guns, and I'll fix them faster."

"Thanks, Doug," he said, feet shuffling as he brushed past him. He stopped the closing door with his foot, watching the man speed down the hallway and disappear down a turn.

The door closed, and Rattmann walked to his table. White rectangles were haphazardly scattered like an incomplete puzzle, with some pushed beneath others. As he gathered the pieces and pulled them together, he began to notice a theme. A bigger picture.

They were blueprints.

ASHPD blueprints.

* * *

A/N: Thanks for reading!

I know my story doesn't have a lot of action right now...but bear with me. We'll get there. Eventually.

Anyways, Henry is from Lab Rat, and all of the information on Chell's project was pulled from the thinkgeek version of her in-game poster. I managed to get the PotatOS kit for Christmas, and Chell's poster really is interesting.


	4. Chapter 4

Chapter 4

The lock clicked.

The act in itself felt forbidden. Doug had rigged the keypad for years to make getting in and out of hiss office as easy as possible. No point wasting time unlocking and relocking his door—he had nothing to hide, nothing to keep stashed away.

Today, he locked his door before leaving.

Doug picked out two figures through the foggy glass of the daycare center. Henry leaned over a desk, a vial gleaming. Liquid beads dribbled onto Chell's potato.

"Eventually, it's going to grow roots," he said, tapping the vial. The remaining drops splattered down. "But that's not until this wears off. For now, it'll get an extra half volt."

"Still not enough to power anything important," she said as she straightened. The corner of Doug's mouth upturned.

"You just wait," said Henry. "I'll change that. But I've got to go." He'd prove her wrong—he'd adapt his artificial intelligences to run on one point six volts. In fact, he might as well make it one point one. Chell would have no more reasons to doubt the power of her potato. He patted the desk and headed toward the door. As much fun as messing around with potatoes was, he didn't want to get fired over it.

"Can I talk to you?" said Doug. He stepped into the hallway behind Henry.

Chell inspected her battery under the yellow wash of the desk light. She glanced up, elbow propped against the table as she watched the scientists through the clear door.

"Someone went through my office," said Doug.

Henry folded his arms across his chest, eyeing the man. "What, you think it was a _spy? _We haven't had those in years," he said, tentative. "Caroline's cracked down."

"But they were trying to steal something," he said. "ASHPD blueprints."

"You're sure?" Henry said. Doug's eyes darted, taking in the figures dashing across his vision—a streak of color here, an indistinct shape there. "Tell me again what happened."

"When I walked in, someone was sorting through blueprints," he said. "And the cabinet I keep them in is locked."

"Who?"

The door clicked closed. "Chell's father."

Henry shifted, arms crossing. "You know she spends all of her time either here or in your office. He was probably just waiting for her to show up."

"Then why was he looking through those files?"

"Come on. You fix the ASHPD for his wife all the time. He's allowed some curiosity."

"I know he was going to take them," he said. His hand tightened around the door handle.

"But he didn't actually take them," said Henry. "You've got nothing to worry about." He ran a hand across his balding head. He exhaled through the nose. The man was crazy. Paranoid. And yet he couldn't bring himself to tell Doug he'd made it all up.

* * *

The potato tumbled to the ground.

Chell growled, scooping it up and repositioning it on the tablecloth. Wires dented into her as she pressed a palm into. She waited, and then lifted her hand and froze to make sure the tuber didn't roll off the edge again. Up and down the 'science fair' hall, other projects sat, still and undisturbed—unlike her stupid, tumbling potato. She let the battery lean against the poster, then stepped away.

"Bet you'll take first place," said Doug. Chell glared. "I mean, if we ever do have one."

The girl threw her backpack over her shoulder, ready to walk out the door when both Emily and Jerry showed up. Strange. The walk to the surface elevator wasn't difficult—she didn't need accompaniment.

"What's going on?" said Chell.

"Nothing," said Emily. She gave a small smile and pulled back a strand of hair. "Just thought you'd like some company."

Chell gave them a wary look, then said her goodbyes to Rattmann before walking away and leaving the man alone with her potato and the sounds of her dying footsteps.

* * *

A purple haze dripped down from the evening sun. Chell squinted, though the sun had long since vanished behind a clump of clouds. The transition between the facility and the world caught her off guard, and she lifted an arm to shield her face against the setting sun.

"Your mom called," said Emily over the revving engine. "Wants you to call her back."

"Okay," said Chell as she stared out the window. She counted every drop of water, watched every bit of condensation roll down and morph into larger drops.

She felt as if time flowed in reverse, pulling them back toward Aperture rather than letting them leave. Not even staring out the window made time pass by faster.

Chell felt the familiar crunch of gravel beneath the tires as they pulled into the driveway. She jumped out and ran for the telephone. A red light flashed like a beacon in the dark, signaling a new message. She punched the play button.

"Call me back when you get a chance. Have some news for you," said Judith Mossman, voice hurried yet tired. She listed a new contact number, and then the message cut off. A seed of disappointment flashed through Chell as she picked up the receiver.

The phone dialed a cheery tone until the other end answered.

"Mom!" said Chell, her excitement barely contained. This had to be the call she'd been waiting for—the one where her mom told her she got the job and that she missed Chell so much that she was coming back to get her.

A pause. A swallow. "I didn't get it."

"What?" she said, voice coming out as a whisper. Emily and Jerry took one look at the girl's face before disappearing into another room.

"I didn't get the job. Some silent guy fresh out of MIT got it instead." Disgust dripped from Judith's voice, and she gave a shaky sigh. "So much for equal opportunity employer."

Chell exhaled, heart sinking. "How? They should have hired you on the spot!" she said, voice rising Pictures of plans, of blueprints, flashed through her head. She'd spent hours explaining it to Emily, hours making sure every detail was perfect.

"That's a little unrealistic—"

"That technology's still new!" she said, edging toward hysteria. "It was perfect."  
A pause.

"Chell, you're not making sense. What are you talking about?"

She went silent, heart beating faster. "The blueprints I sent you," she said.

"And you didn't send them directly to me?" she said.

"Mom, I tried!" said Chell, voice cracking. She _had_ called her, and she told her that she had something really important—but she'd hung up on her anyways

"Then try harder."

Chell blinked twice, biting her lip and glancing into the other room. The two adults lounged on the couch, flipping through channels on the new TV they'd just splurged on. This was the happiest she'd ever seen them, and they'd been that way since their promotion.

She felt like hitting the wall. How stupid could she be? She should have known they wouldn't share this info. She shouldn't have clung to the hope that they had still told her mom, that somehow she would have gotten a job out of it. Stupid, stupid, stupid. She knew this was going to happen, and yet it still felt like a kick in the stomach.

"Get something bigger. Something better," said Mossman. Chell swallowed again, thinking back to Aperture and back to Doug. She thought about how she clung to him as much as he clung to her, both equally happy with the other's companionship. And every time she had to look him in the eye and lie to him and steal from him, she felt sick inside.

"I don't want to," said Chell.

"Well, you're going to have to."

"Mom, just come up here," she said, shifting into a pleading tone. "Work for Aperture."

"I'm not going back there, Chell," she said, voice almost hissing. "I'll go get another degree—a doctorate, if I have to. But I will never work for that company."

* * *

"Did you have a nice chat with your mom?" said Emily.

Chell wrapped her arms around her knees, not moving. She shook her head. "She didn't get the job."

Emily sighed, smoothing out a piece of the girl's dark hair. "That's the way it works sometimes," she said. The girl fell silent, struck with awe at just how easily the lady blew past it—as if helping Judith had meant nothing to them as soon as the promise of a promotion, of a raise—had surfaced. Her throat swelled in anger, and she was done. She didn't want to talk to Emily. She didn't want to talk to Jerry. Not now, not ever.

And the wanted to them notice her silence. She wanted so desperately for them to take a half-second and ask what was wrong, so that she could let the floodgates open and spill out her anger and tears. But they didn't know she was angry. Chell was usually quiet.

They did not ask.

And they could not tell the difference.

* * *

The door slammed as Chell walked in. Her backpack crashed to the floor. Doug straightened.

"Something wrong?" he asked. Chell felt both angry and relieved that he asked, that he had picked up in two seconds what her 'parents' had yet to notice. And she was so happy he'd noticed. But Doug was the one person she couldn't tell.

"I'm okay." Another lie. She walked over to the paint-splattered companion cube, pulling out a tray of colors. "This thing needs a bath," she noted, nudging it with a foot.

As Chell set up her station, a small picture fluttered from her back pocket and landed on the tiled floors.

"What's that?"

She twisted, patting her pocket. Her fingertips met denim as she felt for the picture's sheen edge. On the ground, a bit of glare on the photo's slick surface caught her eye. She bent to scoop it up, and dusted it off with the side of her hand. "Nothing," she said.

"Can I see?" said Doug. Chell pulled the picture close, staring down the man for a moment or two. He stared back, and realized that neither of them would give in. Begrudgingly, she handed over the photo, letting her hand suspend in the air until he took it.

Chell and an adult, a woman he didn't recognize, stared back at him, their faces ringed by furry coat hoods. Hazy blue mountains cluttered the background, and the girl and the adult donned matching artificial smiles. Little white specks streaked across the frame. "Who's she?"

"My mom."

"Doesn't look like her," said Doug, inspecting the picture closer. The woman's hair was too light to be Emily.

"That's because I'm adopted," Chell said flatly. Doug fell silent.

The Chell in the photo looked the same as the Chell in front of him, as if the picture had been taken days ago. But weren't children usually adopted out at a younger age? "This looks recent," he eventually said.

"It is."

The question hung, unasked and unanswered. Why would she get adopted out when she was almost a teenager? And to two Aperture scientists, no less?

Doug met Chell's eyes, turning the picture in his hands before offering it back. The girl slid it back into her pocket, looking away.

"She must hate me," said Chell, blinking. Doug frowned. "I'm always getting in her way. College, career, everything." She wiped her nose, not mentioning that her mother's pregnancy caused her to drop out of college. She didn't mention how the years following were spent in better regret, usually directed at Chell. Or how a few years ago, she rebooted her life and went back to college.

And now that meant starting her career without Chell. A true reboot.

"That seems harsh," said Doug, at a loss as to how to comfort her. Being adopted after twelve years must have felt like a slap in the face. there was more to this story. There had to be something she wasn't telling him.

"You haven't met my mother."

He exhaled, walking over to sit on his companion cube. He twirled a brush with his fingertips, thinking. The girl wandered throughout the room.  
There was something strange about this, something strange about Chell. He glanced at his watch and shifted, picking up the discarded paints.

He began to paint.

* * *

Clicks. A space bar. A squirrely-looking man typed, glancing up as Doug approached the CEO's office. He hovered, watching the man use his computer while balancing a phone on his shoulder.

"If you need the CEO, give me a minute," he said, name tag identifying him as Gregory—or, Greg. Caroline's assistant. "Only so much a man can do." While he waited, Doug slumped into a plush, outdated chair—Caroline had insisted upon bringing them up from a lower level, supposedly for budget reasons rather than sentimental ones.

A few minutes later, the scrawny man waved Doug over. The scientist stood, smoothing his off-white coat and frowning at a stain he hadn't noticed before.

"She's open now," said Greg. "Go, but make it quick. She's got a company to run." Doug nodded, edging open the door. A sense of dread came over him as he pushed his way in. He'd spoken to Caroline on more than one occasion, but he never was able to shake the feeling that the world would dissolve into chaos if he lingered around her too long.

"Hello?" he said, tentative. Caroline set down a pen and smiled.

"Douglas," she said, her voice lower than the higher, exuberant voice from decades ago. She didn't offer him a seat.

He pulled in a breath. "I think there's spies in Aperture," he said, deciding to dive into the conversation.

"What makes you say that?" said Caroline, questioning. But she wasn't dumb. No person running a science company could be—in fact, she knew that Aperture had spies within its ranks. She would have been surprised if there weren't. In fact, she knew about every spy in this place—she had every Black Mesa employee under her watch, all assigned to menial jobs like manufacturing or test observation—jobs that wouldn't cripple Aperture when information leaked out. She blinked.

"Someone went through my office," he said. The woman showed no signs of emotion, only blinking as he summarized what happened.

"That does happen from time to time," she said, searching through her mind for a moment until she remembered where Doug worked. Ah, yes. Quantum Tunneling Device repair. She twisted around and dove into a filing cabinet. Doug slipped into a chair while she picked up Jerry's file—the man Doug claimed to be spying. Sure enough, Black Mesa markings were stamped across his page.

So Doug was correct in his suspicions, but he didn't need to know that. She slid the file back into place and picked up Rattmann's.

"He was about to take ASHPD blueprints," he said. Caroline finally looked up, flopping the file onto the desk.

"They weren't locked?" she said, voice dropping as she rubbed her hands. She stared at Doug, unmoving. "You know how important those are."

"I needed them for a project I'm working on," he said. "No one's ever in my office." He wanted to describe how far off the beaten path his lab was, or how he got so tired of fixing the mistakes of the stupid test subjects. He could only repair so many ASHPDs before wanting to make a change.

"Never leave those out," she said, voice dangerously low. "The quantum tunneling device is all we have left. Without it, Aperture is _nothing_," said Caroline, maintaining eye contact for a long moment before shifting into a calmer voice. "If you lose those files, you're as good as dead to me," she said, then straightened. "With that said, I'll look into it." She smiled, standing to escort the man from her room.

The door clicked behind him. Doug leaned against a wall, eyes briefly closing.

"I know what you mean," said Greg, laughing at the man's sigh of relief. He didn't look up from his monitor. "Pretty scary for a woman in her 60's, right?"

* * *

A/N: As always, thanks for reading! I've done a lot of writing for this story these past few weeks. I've got the rough drafts done for another five chapters, ahaha. Anyways, Caroline's going to be playing a major part from now on. There's a lot of important things about her that have yet to be revealed.


	5. Chapter 5

Chapter 5

A month passed.

The road kicked up dust as the faded school bus pulled away. Chell coughed once, adjusting her backpack before walking down the road.

It never took long to walk to Aperture from the bus stop—and besides, it gave her refuge from the other kids in her grade. To them, she was an enigma. A silent girl; a blank face without a personality. Not worthy of their friendship.

She kicked a rock, letting it clatter to the side. The barbed-wire fences of Aperture came into view, and soon enough the girl found herself back in the daycare center.

Her evenings at the science company tended to be quiet, and yet not uneventful. When she finished homework, she threw together sketches when no one was watching, passing them off as 'practice' the other times.

In the last letter she'd gotten from her mother, Chell had saved the return address. These sketches went directly to her. As they said, only a fool makes the same mistake twice.

Henry marveled over her potato, already sprouting roots and spreading across the table. "That fertilizer sure works," he said. "Not sure how long it'll keep growing." He rubbed his head. Chell poked at it, grabbing the multimeter and measuring it.

Still 1.6 volts. Still a half-volt higher than her competition.

And she had checked every other project. None of the others had dates—only names. Eventually Aperture might have enough projects for a science fair, but Chell doubted they could ever get enough girls.

* * *

Doug cleared his throat as he walked around the corner. "Finally, they let me off early," he said.

Henry gave a forced smile. "Headed home?"

Doug shook his head. "Not at all," he said.

A pause. "If you want to stay here, be my guest. I'm going home. See you," he said, giving Chell a wave. "Keep watching that potato."

Chell glanced at her watch, her only reliable source of time. 8:30. Still an hour and a half before her parents clocked out.

She followed Doug back into the room. He retrieved his cube, pushed out of sight earlier because of Henry. Henry'd never liked the cube—something about seeing his co-worker cart around the heart-adorned box set him on edge. Doug slung it over his shoulder.

"I found a spot a few floors down. It's a perfect spot for a mural," he said.

* * *

Doug paused, letting Chell bump into him. "Do you hear that? The faint music?" he said. Chell shrugged, listening. Silence enveloped the hallway.

He sighed, not apologizing. They moved on.

Though the buildings and rooms themselves felt modern, Chell couldn't help but notice the air of abandonment. Room after room slipped by them, each emptier than the last. A poster here. A broken chair there. In one room, a crumpled safety poster sat on the tile, curled with age.

Doug paused at a particular office, dated back ten years.

A perfect place to start.

He picked out a pencil from his pocket, immediately scribbling on a quarter of the wall, filling it with organized chaos. From his companion cube, Doug pulled out a radio and tossed it to Chell. She twisted the knobs, shifting the scanner through channel after channel. It warped between songs, a garbled mess until Chell settled on a station. A softer tune murmured in the background.

They settled on the theme of music, though neither of them felt like singing.

"Use broad strokes," Doug said, covering the wall with a splash of blue. He motioned for Chell to join him, letting her throw in her own colors. "Feel the music and feel the brush." He leaned down to grab his book, thumbing through the dog-eared pages for a moment before letting it thump back onto the ground. Chell peered over, paint dripping onto her foot as she examined the blue book. "Art Therapy," it said. "The Bennett Way."

Drip.

She turned away, watching the man's feverish strokes. She thought about asking about the book, about the therapy part of the title—but there was nothing Doug could say to her that Chell didn't already know. In just the way that he moved as he painted, so smooth and fluid, Chell could tell that art itself was more relieving than any therapy book ever could be.

Her brush slowed down, and she bit her tongue in concentration. She had to get the lines just perfect. Although Doug had just sketched them up there—by no means an exact blueprint to follow—she didn't want to mess them up.

"Expression is the goal," Doug said once. "Not perfection."

But for Chell, perfect was everything. She needed to be able to copy something exactly, to have her vision for a drawing perfectly match the outcome. But the pressure to do this was almost paralyzing.

Before the clock struck ten, the two stood back, observing the once-blank wall. Even though the rest of the room was open for painting, the two had chosen to work together, splitting off and building upon each other's work like branches from a tree. A mishmash of artwork exploded from the lifeless wall, and yet the mural itself only covered half of the wall.

Chell twirled her brush. "Are you staying?" she said, mentally rehearsing a pitch to her parents on why she should also stay longer.

He shook his head. "We'll finish another day."

And so Doug rinsed off his brushes, dabbing them dry with his coat. He closed up his cube and left it pushed to the room's side. Chell twisted her head as they walked out the door, shooting Doug a look.

"No one's going to bother it," he said, hitting the light switch. "No one's ever down here."

* * *

The days grew shorter and the nights grew longer, but this didn't matter at Aperture, where the difference between night and day was the amount of people in the facility. One evening, when only Aperture's night owls remained fluttering about, Caroline's phone rang.

When Greg didn't pick up her call—like he always did— she frowned.

Riiiiiiiing. Riiiing.

What was he _waiting_ for? A flash of color caught her eye—an alert. This call wasn't going through her assistant's line. This one was placed directly to her.

She leaned across her desk, answering.

"Aperture Laboratories," she chimed. "Hold on a moment." She cradled the phone against her chest, walking over to the door. She stuck out her head, speaking softly as to not startle her assistant.

"Go on and go home. I'm finishing up here," she said. "Science cannot wait, but neither can sleep." He nodded, blinking himself awake. He stretched before pushing in his chair and heading toward the elevator to the surface.

She closed the door just as softly, clicking the dead bolt into place.

"All clear," she said, dropping her cheerful tone. Though the long distance call would be expensive, it would be worth every penny.

"No one else is in your range of hearing?" said the man, one of her loyal spies over at Black Mesa.

"You know how careful I am," she said. "Nothing leaves this room unless I want it to."

"Good. You wouldn't want this overheard."

"Tell me what happened."

"They've got it," the man said. "It looks like a portal device, but it's not. The lab boys here nicknamed it the gravity gun, but it's got Aperture written all over it."  
Caroline exhaled.

"Are you mad?"

"I'm not angry," she said. "Black Mesa 'steals' technology from us all the time, and I would bet my position as CEO that it won't be the last. You of all people should know that. And besides, it's not important, anyways." A lie.

"But how important was it?" he said, voice anxious.

"It's an older prototype," she said. "Developed a few years ago, but found no practical use." She kept her voice cool, but spoke between clenched teeth.

Anxiety jabbed at her. The gravity gun was closely related to the tunneling device—in fact, Black Mesa possessing the energy manipulator placed them only two small steps from Aperture waters, and one leap away from a splash into portals.

She wanted to fire him. Right there. Via phone. Or even better—unearth his connections to Aperture and throw him to those Black Mesa wolves. Oh, now that would be such sweet revenge.

And yet the moment passed. Caroline pushed past it, like she always did. Besides, this wasn't that man's fault—the blame belonged to someone within Aperture. And oh, how she looked forward to finding that rat.

"How close is it to completion?" she asked, voice still.

"A few days, maybe. They've been working on it nonstop for over a month."

Caroline flipped her calendar back a page. She flicked through her memories, her conversations, struggling to find _something_that could have warned her about this.

Oh.

A tab stuck out from a filing cabinet—D. Rattmann. The one who warned her of spies—the one she'd ignored. And yet he spoke of tunneling device plans, not the gravity gun. And yet Caroline knew that that device—and those plans as well—were in the man's office. That, she knew. He was the one. He _had_to be the leak.

Caroline hesitated, her silence heavy.

"They're not supposed to touch that," Caroline said, hissing. "That technology is off limits."

The spy for Aperture swallowed. "Look this is took risky—calling you."

"Forget about that. Not a word of this will get to Black Mesa—and if it does, your life won't be worth living. Better be careful," she said, speaking through a forced smile.

She hung up the phone before he could answer, brushing off her dress and glancing at the clock. Good. It was only 1 am.

* * *

Chell didn't go to Doug's office that day. He had a meeting—in a few hours, he would present his modified portal device, and Chell knew she'd better stay out of the way.

Someone she knew-though not well, like Doug or Henry, came in to cart her off to help with her job. This lady didn't smile—just introduced herself and gave Chell a curious look before leading her into parts of Aperture she'd never seen before.

She knew she shouldn't be surprised—Aperture was always expanding. The facility extended from the bottom of the salt mines and up to somewhere close to the surface. And they already had another extension planned—another level for another decade. Where they got the money to build these kinds of things, Chell did not know.

She typed in a code to open up a wing—already making it more secure and secretive than the majority of the facility. Inside, it split off into several large rooms with several luxurious desks. She recognized some of these employees, though wasn't familiar with them. After befriending Doug, Chell's daily introduction to Aperture's workforce had stopped altogether.

From behind the newest-looking monitor she'd sheen in the facility, Henry waved. Funny—he had never shown her his office before.

"Welcome to the last of Cave Johnson's development projects," he said.

The light-haired lady—Karla, as Henry introduced her—dragged in a sizable metal sphere. She dropped it onto the table, but the robot tilted and rolled before she grabbed a handle to stabilize it.

"This is what we've been working on," said Henry.

Chell pushed her desk chair closer, examining it. She glanced at Henry.

"Artificial intelligence. Robots that think, feel, and make good decisions-like a human," he said. "That's what we do. This guy here is Aperture's first—and only— fully-artificial intelligence."

Karla twisted a screwdriver, unhinging the robot's curved side panel. No lights, no sound squeaked out of the sphere—Chell assumed it was powered off for repairs.

"He's practice for another project we're working on," Henry said. He exchanged a glance with his co-worker, deciding not to go into the details of that project.

"An experiment to see if we could make a man's personality out of nothing." He didn't say that they had hoped—stupidly, in hindsight—that a construct like this could one day run the facility.

"What's he like?" said Chell. She picked at the foam padding of her chair.

"Talkative and blunt," he said. "And vaguely British. Not sure whose idea that was," he said, shrugging. "A good challenge, though he's not much of a success."  
"He's got a few problems," said Henry. She snorted, grumbling as she fiddled around inside the robot's surprisingly hollow casing. "We're still working on him."

"He's an idiot," said Karla, jumping in.

"Well, it's not that he isn't intelligent. He is. We created him," said Henry.

"But he _can't learn_," she said. "Mistake after mistake every time he's turned on—which is expected—but they are all the same mistakes. As an artificial intelligence, wasn't that the point of making him? Shouldn't he be able to be able to learn from his failures?"

"How does he learn then?" said Chell.

"Shut him down and upload information," said the scientist. "I'm adding in a map of the facility as we speak. Maybe now he'll stop making such stupid navigation errors."

"Can we turn him on?" Chell said. Karla looked up, surprised.

"After I make sure this guy doesn't kill us all," she said, "maybe."

* * *

"And that," said Doug, blinded by the projector light, "is my solution to the breaking of the ASHPDs." He cleared his throat once, twice, looking out onto the shapeless faces of the people gathered in the conference room. "Thank you," he said.

The room was crammed with people—after all, this presentation did get them out of work for an hour AND let them witness the witchcraft that was the energy field manipulator. In fact, only after stepping out of the bright light did he realize the unexpectedly high attendance.

A smattering of applause greeted him, gradually fading into conversation and squeaking chairs. The clapping faded into conversation and squeaking chairs.

A soft tune filled his heart, materializing out of nowhere as Doug gathered some of his papers . But the sound shattered when he glanced up, pulling away from him like a distant dream. The notes still lingered, broken and floating like objects suspended in the air, like something he could reach out and grab.

The sound of high heels replaced his notes, falling into a rhythm not unlike the music. A lady stood in front of him, arms crossed and a pen dangling from one hand.

"Ms. Caroline," Doug said, politely nodding. She regarded him for a moment, taking in his well-kept face yet mismatched eyes.

"Do you plan on converting _all_of the tunneling devices to possess the energy manipulator?"

"Should I?"

"Absolutely. And as soon as possible. For now, though, walk with me." She turned on her heels and clinked out the door.

Doug accidentally knocked a defective turret to the ground, thinking for the umpteenth time how glad he was he hadn't brought a functional turret. With a live audience, real bullets were not the best idea. That's where these guys came in handy—no bullets, no danger, yet still a great way to demonstrate the gun's full effects.

He shuffled, letting his manila folder flop onto a cube before hustling to catch up with Caroline.

"Sorry," she said, picking up the pace. "Not enough time to sit and chat. I've got a facility to run."

Doug faltered in his steps.

"Still," she said, tucking a file under her chin and pulling out papers from his presentation. "I did enjoy the illustrations." She tugged out a few pages of art, with a realistic-looking figure demonstrating the correct way to use the modified device. Other pages contained figures with lines scratched across them, each demonstrating an incorrect use of the gun.

"Chell drew those," he said, the smugness in his voice reminiscent of a proud father.

"The girl?" said Caroline.

"She's been getting really good," he said with a nod. "She practices all the time."

"But these drawings—they're almost spot-on," she said.

"I'll have to bring in new things for her to draw soon," said Doug. He had to admit that her drive to improve, her stubbornness to accept anything less than perfection made her progress incredibly quickly. "I'm teaching her everything I know."

"So _you're_the one leaving pictures around my facility," said Caroline.

Doug swallowed, hand trailing on the cool metal of the railing. "Only abandoned areas," he said. "I didn't think anyone would see them."

"They're fine," she said, not wanting to admit the number of times she'd stared at the art. Part of her felt outraged at him for defacing her facility; the other part marveled over their beauty. "Just make sure they don't show up in the upper levels," she said. "There's canvases for that—And panels are not canvases."

But Caroline was a woman of science, not a woman of art. She didn't understand that abandoned walls or discarded panels were more satisfying to paint on than a stretched canvas. It was his own way of throwing a bit of humanity onto the bleak walls.

Caroline's eyes narrowed. She paused, leaning her hand against a catwalk railing and looking down at the specks milling about levels beneath them.

"How often is she there?" she said.

Doug paused, also leaning over. His palms hit cold metal; the chill slipped into his arms. "Almost every day," he said, "though less often since school began."

Something cycled inside of Caroline. "What does the girl do with her drawings?" she said, something clicking in her brain.

He shrugged. "Take them home. Burn them. I wouldn't know."

The woman stared at him for a stretch of time, watching his face to see if the same thing coming together in her brain was also manifesting within his.

"So did you ever find out anything…?" he said, curious. The past month lent no opportunities to speak with the CEO—she was, as she said, a busy woman. She kept staring, waiting for him to put two and two together, to make the logical—well, tiptoe—into what he had made so alarmingly obvious to her. Could he really be this dense?

It was her. The girl.

She was the one sitting in that office and copying down blueprints daily until they were spot-on. She _stole_ the plans. Doug didn't even realize that his little drawing lessons were putting all of Aperture at risk. An incompetent employee let a preteen girl pull the wool over his eyes-and for what? _Friendship_? With a girl over fifteen years younger than him?

But what could she do? Her own spy at Black Mesa just revealed their successes—she had no way of 'knowing' this for months, until their product became commercially successful.

She could fire him.

That's what Cave always did. Kicked them out, pushed them out, and made her tag along to make sure they didn't cry all over the carpet. But this man's mind was too unique to fire. That problem with the tunneling device had plagued Aperture for years, and he was the first to consider merging the device with newer technology.

His mind. Something about the way it combined things, the way he saw things no one else saw—that had to be it. His schizophrenia alone was far too interesting and far too uncommon for Caroline to let go.

Besides, it wasn't the man's fault. He was just too trusting of her, despite being the paranoid one convinced of spying within the building.

It was funny, actually, when she thought about it. The one he trusted was the one to betray him.

"Don't worry," she said, eventually. "I _have_been looking into it. It's being taken care of."

Doug wasn't sure how to feel. Though he'd never gotten along with Jerry—too bossy—he was still Chell's father. And yet he couldn't bring himself to ignore the snooping. If he ended up stealing those plans, Doug would be out of a job, along with the rest of Aperture.

But nothing had been stolen. Not yet.

"Your office is under watch," she said. "If anyone tries anything, I'll know about it," she said. Doug still stared out across the railing. The soft shapes of the structures patterned together like a bizarre game of Tetris.

"Feel free to leave everything scattered about in your office. Oh, and you can rig your door again."

Doug gave her a surprised look.

"You think you're the only one that gets tired of punching in codes?"

Caroline laughed, giving the man a pat on the shoulder. As she walked away, Doug watched, unsure if he should feel relieved or terrified. Either way, by the time Doug glanced up again, the CEO was just a blur in the distance.

* * *

A/N: As always, thanks for reading! Also, a shoutout to Jenovaii for all of her help!

10


	6. Chapter 6

Chapter 6

Caroline barely heard the knock on the door.

"Come in," she said, rubbing her eyes. Her frazzled assistant stepped in, a thick envelope tucked under his arm.

"Your budget reports." Caroline held out an upturned palm, staring. The dark-red haired man handed it over—after all, the CEO insisted upon it. She had done the reports every other year she'd worked for Aperture, and she wasn't about to stop now.

She tossed the envelope into a desk drawer, twisting the key in the lock. She gave a pained smile—she already knew what was in that envelope. Spending reports. Dismal profit reports. And beneath it all, a small envelope containing a check with enough money to run Aperture for another year. Science must continue—that's what mattered, right? Where the money came from wasn't important.

"We did get those camera set up in Mr. Rattmann's office," said Greg, hovering.

"If anyone other than Doug goes into that room," Caroline said, "you let me know." And Greg knew as well as anyone that the CEO would want to know this immediately, regardless of the time of day.

"So why the change in heart?" he said. "You've got him pegged as a loyal Aperture employee in his file."

She glanced back at her filing cabinets—they took up over half of her office. She had a certain, well, obsession with keeping up-to-date records on the facility. In fact, she considered making herself a file room—though she refused to switch completely to computers.

She pulled out Doug's file, flipping to the schizophrenia page.

Oh, she had detailed notes here. And for good reason, too. Close shaves like the one with Jerry only validated her suspicions. She could never be too sure of how many spies lurked within her facility's walls—or when one of them might strike.

"He's being targeted by spies," she said. "I know it. They're up to something. And as soon as I can prove it, I'll use them for testing."

She could never have too many test subjects, after all. She loved testing—in fact, she lived for it. Experiments. Results. Variables. Caroline stared at Rattmann's file, mulling it over. An idea sparked.

Like the majority of Aperture employees, Doug got his medicine in-house, from the pharmaceutical and medical research wing. She tapped on the edge of her phone for a moment before dialing a number.

"Aperture Science Center for the Creation and Distribution of Medicine," a bored female voice answered. "May I help you?"

"You could start by telling me when Mr. Rattmann's due for a prescription refill." A scramble on the other end-the instant recognition of her voice always sped things up.

"Not for a few weeks yet," she said, more energetic than before.

"Good." She drew out the word. "Take his medicine and replace a fourth of it with a strong hallucinogenic. But make sure they look identical," she said. "He can't know."

Doug Rattmann let information slip into Black Mesa hands—and while she still wanted to keep him around, she couldn't let that slide. She deserved a little experimentation—wasn't that the point of keeping around a schizophrenic scientist?

* * *

Jerry grabbed picture frames from the shelf, shoving them into a bag.

"What are you doing?" said Chell. She lounged on the couch, staring out a window. It was late, and she only saw the soft glow of street lamps. No sign of the moon.

"Packing," he said. "For vacation. We're leaving in an hour."

Chell frowned—it was late. Past the time of dashing off on vacations, and yet her parents grabbed things as if they were fleeing the country.

She went into her room anyways—getting ready to leave should be easy enough. Every article of clothing she owned slipped easily into a roller suitcase. She shoved in a few other objects as well—just as she saw her parents do. She had room to spare.

She hauled her bag to the car, tossing it in to the rapidly filling trunk. Whatever this trip was, Chell got the feeling it was for longer than just the weekend. After climbing into the car, she rested her head against the cool glass window. She yawned. Her parents darted to and from the house, shoving in random items before slamming the trunk closed.

"We'll get the rest after everything cools down," said Jerry. The engine roared to life, headlights sweeping over familiar streets as they pulled out and drove away. Warm air hissed out, and Chell drifted into a daze.

The car sputtered to a stop, and Chell jerked awake. "Where are we?" she said, voice groggy.

"Aperture. We just need to grab a couple of things before we get going."

* * *

Chell's fingers trembled as she punched in Doug's passcode. 1498. Easy enough to remember. A green light flashed, and the door popped open.

"Grab the ASHPD," Emily whispered. "You know where it is."

"Why?"

"Your paranoid friend's gone for this weekend—" she said, "this is our one chance to get it." After being suspended in a state of suspense for the past few weeks, her parents had only just decided that nothing would come out of Jerry's slip up. Absolutely nothing had happened—they didn't suspect him. At all. And now was the time to strike.

Jerry yanked at drawer handles, the metal clanging. Locked. He pulled again, and each refused to budge—without the keys, they weren't getting to the blueprints. He cursed.

Low on a shelf, Chell caught a glimpse of a smooth white shell. One look told her it was one of the yet-to-be converted portal devices—and that one in particular was a single-portal device. Doug tended to save those for last. They were much easier to modify. Chell said nothing, but a moment later Emily spotted it. She dove into the shelving, grabbing at it. Things clattered, and Chell cringed—quietness remained an essential part of this mission. Even she had heard the horror stories whispered among employees about Black Mesa spies. Disappearance. Testing—until they died. Experimented on. Turned into a biology project. The possibilities were only limited by the imagination. But more than anything else, Chell didn't want her—or her parents—caught.

Jerry hefted up the device, smiling. Almost giddy. "We've finally got it!" he said, waving it around. All they had to do was take it and run, not stopping until they hit New Mexico.

"And look," said Emily, digging around the same shelf. She yanked out a few papers, flipping through. "They're blueprints." Chell watched, grimacing inside. The internal configuration of the single-portal device varied from the dual-portal device, and Doug had found it easier to keep it on hand.

"We've got to call these in," he said. "This can't wait. And no one's here."

Chell sprinted to Doug's telephone and pressed her hand against it. "Call her first," she said, face slack with desperation.

Emily's gaze softened. She nodded, reaching out for the phone. Chell refused, punching in from memory the phone number her mother gave her. As it rang, she handed it over. Considering how unpleasant Judith could be in the mornings, Chell didn't want to try talking to her in the earliest hours of the morning.

Chell shivered, rubbing her arms. Her sweatpants did little to keep out the chill, and her jacket—she'd forgotten it in the Employee Daycare Center a few days ago.

She could run and grab it—it's not like the two would care if she disappeared for a moment. Besides, if they were leaving with a stolen portal device, the chances of returning to Aperture was slim. And she wanted to leave Doug a message—a way to say goodbye.

The phone rang in Emily's ear, eventually clicking into voicemail. She glanced up, seeing Chell head for the door. "Where are you going?" she said, hand over the receiver. Chell rubbed her arms again and mouthed the word 'jacket.'

She slipped out the door.

"She didn't pick up," said Emily, waiting until she was certain the girl was out of earshot. "Let's just go straight to Black Mesa."

He agreed, and she tapped in the number. The plus to this was that they, unlike Mossman, would get the credit if they went directly to Black Mesa—and they were going to need all of the good credit they could get.

The other end picked up and the two dove into conversation.

Emily and Jerry passed the phone like a TV remote, each struggling for control. "Right here, there's a breakdown—cooling fans, a ring singularity ring, an event horizon estimator wheel," said Jerry, but Emily pulled at the phone.

"The whole thing's powered by a miniature black hole—an infinite amount of power in an infinitely small space," she said. "But see if you can get this to Dr. Rosenberg—-"

The phone line cut off in a shower of sparks. Emily jumped away. A speaker mounted on the wall gave a soft click.

"Oh. Looks like the phone line to your room's been cut," said a familiar voice. "I don't know why that happened."

A pause. A panic. Emily shoved the blueprints into Jerry's bag. He darted to the door, slick hands yanking at the handle. A keypad started up at him, red light blinking. The digits stared up at him, waiting for him to punch in the code. It was only a combination of four numbers—it couldn't be that difficult.

"What was the code?" he yelled, punching random buttons. The red light continued to blink.

"I don't know!" she said, searching for Chell until she remembered that the girl had left—and she was their only way out. This room had no exits, no windows, and no portal conductive surfaces—the ASHPD was useless in here

The voice continued to come through the speaker, though muffled. "Hold on a minute," said Caroline. "I'm sending down a security crew. Don't go anywhere."

"Get down," Emily hissed, clutching the Portal gun. The two ducked behind the counter.

"So was there anything you wanted to say to me?" said Caroline. "An apology, perhaps? We have plenty of time."

"I bet I can hit one of them," Jerry whispered. "I'll catch them by surprise an can make a break for it."

"Hiding only reflects negatively on you as Aperture Employees," said Caroline. "But then again, I shouldn't be _too_ surprised, knowing what I do about you."

"She can't do anything to us," Emily said. "We haven't done anything." Besides, they'd been working as spies for years—surely the company would help them out of this.

"I'll go ahead and do the honors of calling Black Mesa for you," said Caroline.

"Why?" said Jerry, voice raised. Perhaps if they denied it altogether, she would stop.

"You broke into Doug Rattmann's office, attempted to remove vital testing equipment, and placed a call to the _Black Mesa Research Facility_ from an Aperture phone. I'm not dumb, you know," she said. "Though I'm sure your employer will be thrilled to hear about your latest promotion at Aperture—I'll go ahead and do the honors. Tell them how horrible you were at spying—how it wasn't right for you," she said. "And, of course, how much stress it was on your family. Your daughter," she said, smirking behind her microphone.

She switched the camera's views to the rest of the lab, searching for the girl. Empty shelves and abandoned equipment dominated her view, and it took her a half-second to realize the girl was nowhere in sight.

A twinge of panic rose up in her—where was the girl? She was by far the most capable spy of the bunch—and she had _just_ been in the room. Caroline switched off her microphone and glared over at Greg. "Find her. I don't care if you have to lock down this facility—you FIND that girl."

* * *

Beeps and blares shook the enrichment center.

Chell paused, twisting—behind her, light flashed and a chamberlock hissed closed. In the distance she heard shots and footsteps. She broke into a run, motion lights illuminating her path with streaks of red and white. As the alarms and shouts grew louder, the girl threw herself under a desk in a nearby office.

She listened, catching her breath.

The alarms cut off, replaced with more yells. Feet clanged down the catwalks. A security team dashed by, hurrying toward Doug's lab. She held her breath as streaks of light flickered in from the hallway, then disappeared.

Silence reigned again. Chell peeked out the doorway, the men's silhouettes disappearing into the haze of distance.

She took one final look before breaking into another run. The Employee Daycare Center came into view, but one look through the smudged glass windows told her it was not a good place to hide. The open desks and opaque walls would be a nightmare for hide-and-seek, much less for hide-from-the-security-team. She darted inside and grabbed her jacket, shrugging it on.

Chell flipped the corner, heading to her second-best shot: the science fair hall. Dark, abandoned, and a bit eerie, it made the perfect place to hide. The sides of each table extended to the floor, creating little dark caves. The table's fourth side remained open—and each open side faced toward the clear walls of the Center. A problem.

Chell twisted, searching for another spot. A scrunched-up banner sat on a table—a leftover from a previous Bring Your Daughter to Work Day over eleven years ago. _Perfect. _She grabbed it, hitting off some of the dust before draping it like a tablecloth. When folded in half, it completely covered the area beneath the desk.

She crawled underneath, darkness overwhelming her vision. She wiped the dust on her pant leg. The banner swayed, and patches of light darted in and out until the banner stilled. Chell pulled her knees to her chest and breathed, the chill of the air sliding through her body.

She rested her head against her knees. Exhaustion overwhelmed her—she wanted nothing more than to fall asleep—to rest her head against the desk's edge and pretend that she was back in the car, back on a road trip with the warm air and constant motion lulling her to sleep.

But sleep was out of the question. Those alarms and that security team could have only meant one thing: her parents had been caught. And, for the first time since she'd come to Aperture, Chell felt afraid—it was only a matter of time before she was discovered.

It was quiet here, and the silence terrified her.

* * *

A/N: ((Surprise! We're doing it now!)) No really, you should have seen that one coming...

I left Caroline's lines at the beginning rather vague for a reason-if you can guess why, you win all of the bonus points.

Anyways, I hope everyone's enjoying this story! A huge thanks to everyone that's faved/followed/reviewed so far. It's incredibly encouraging!


	7. Chapter 7

Chell drifted.

Too scared to fall asleep and yet too tired to stay awake, she stayed in a state of disoriented dreamlessness. Hours passed—it must have been morning by the time she pulled herself together. The gradual increase of noise told her it must be time for work within the facility—and yet, the overall feel of the facility seemed less active than average.

She shifted away from her bunched-up jacket, shaped into a makeshift pillow for the cold tiled floor. Nose still buried in the folds of fabric, she inhaled. A harsh smell, all science and sterility, lingered on her clothes. But, beneath she smelled an even more potent smell of laundry fabric softener that filled her with an intense longing for home—not just her new house in town, but her true _home._.

She uncurled herself from the floor, pushing herself into a sitting position. Her foot brushed the banner, and her heart jumped. A patch of light danced in, a bright and warm reminder of the outside world. She longed to lift it up higher, to poke out her head into the light and let fresh air stream in. The girl leaned forward, grabbing a corner of the musty canvas and carefully restoring her curtain to its original position.

Click click click.

Wheels turned overhead, the sound growing increasingly louder.

"Ah, a science fair," a male voice said. Chell heard the sound of wheels braking. "Not particularly organized now, is it? Projects scattered about. Collecting dust."

The sudden voice—loud and close—knocked the air out of Chell's lungs. Hours upon hours of silence, of hiding—and then _words_ out of nowhere. She jerked back, clanging against the back edge of the desk. It rattled, and a pen toppled to the ground. Above, she heard a scraping, sliding sounds—like sandpaper on wood.

The banner thumped to the ground.

Light streamed in, flooding her vision with deep gray panels. To her left stood the entrance to the project hall, and Chell knew if anyone walked through that doorway and happened to glance to the right, they would spot her.

She pulled into the shadows, pressing her fingers against the metal desk. With someone so close, she couldn't risk fixing her curtain. She'd spent so long hiding from people, and it would be pointless to throw that away now. But still, the risk of discovery loomed even larger.

Leaning down, she pressed her face into the floor and peered out the tiny gap between the desk and the floor. A strip of light lazered across her face; she squinted before sweeping her eyes across the floor, searching for a telltale pair of shoes.

But there weren't any feet. Just a voice.

A faint blue color tinted the floor, and as the British-sounding voice blabbered on, she heard a distinctly mechanical creak and began to piece things together. She gave a silent sigh of relief, hand across her heart. This robot—he was one of Henry's. He was designed to assist people, and he wouldn't care at all if Chell adjusted a banner. In fact, he might even offer to help.

Chell bunched up the fallen banner and edged her way out. Carefully, she tossed it across the back edge of the table, and then stood up slowly as to no startle the bot. She smoothed the banner and jabbed the corners into cracks, avoiding eye contact.

"Aargh!" The robot jerked back, trembling like a dog in a thunderstorm. "You can't just do that!" said the sphere, shutters drawing in. "Jump out of nowhere. Scare _me_to death."

She stared up at the robot, lifting a finger to her lips.

"Quiet? Want me to be quiet?" he said, giving a slight nod. "Well, in that case, maybe you shouldn't leap from under a table and scare. Didn't consider that, did you?"

Chell shushed him again, and the robot fell silent. She squeezed her way back beneath the table, making sure to disturb the banner as little as possible. Another collapse could be disastrous. As she curled herself back into a ball, the sphere began to blabber again.

"So what are you hiding from, anyways?" he said. Chell said nothing. "Playing some good 'ol hide and seek, then. I see. Love that game, though never actually played."

Footsteps sounded in the distance, the sound amplified by the silence. The girl pulled her arms around her knees tightly, wishing that the robot she'd wanted so desperately to speak to before, back in Henry's office, would just _stop _speaking right now.

"Just go away," she said, voice cracking.

A pause. "I would, but uh, I have no idea where I am. They told me to explore the facility. To 'just follow the rail.' Too bad this map looks _nothing_ like reality," he said shutters closing. "These little dashes look nothing like rooms. I mean, how are you even supposed to get from one line to another?"

In the room adjacent, a door creaked. "Check in there," said a low voice." Maybe she came back."

Her heart skipped a beat.

Two men sifted through the room. Shuffling. The soft click of filing cabinets being opened, of desk chairs wheeled to the side so that they could duck beneath the desks to look for her.

"She's not here," said a male voice. He swore.

"Caroline's locked down this wing. She's around here somewhere," said Greg to the other man, sighing. Of course, _he_was the one to get stuck with tracking her down—with help from security, of course, though the man accompanying the CEO's assistant looked more like an annoyed scientist rather than a real security guard. Typical Aperture—cheap as usual.

"Try down there," said the other man.

The two cut through the Daycare Center and flipped out into the science fair hallway. Behind another pane of glass, a metal sphere dangled from a management rail. It stared at the children's projects, not even flinching as they approached. Greg glanced over at the other man, who shrugged.

"Hey," said Greg. "What are you doing?"

"Just, er, reading these posters. Fascinating, they are."

"They're made by children," said the assistant. "But that doesn't matter. We're looking for a girl. Seen her?"

"Ah! No wonder it was so bloody difficult to read," he said optic widening. "Knew it. And hmm. Thinking. Takes a moment sometimes. Well, I _have _seen a girl, but I can't actually tell you where she is now, can I? Defeats the whole purpose of the game, really."

Despite being feet below the sphere, Greg glared down at the robot. Whatever this tin circle thought, this was no game. They'd been at it for hours, and all he had to do was just _tell them_ and then they could get back to their normal jobs. "Just tell us where she is," he said.

The robot twitched, conflicting commands clashing within him. According to the rules of hide and seek, he couldn't tell the men where the girl hid. That just wasn't fair. And yet Greg, who had asked him to break said rule, held a lot more authority within Aperture than the girl. But still, he _had_talked to the girl before the assistant had even shown up, and he couldn't go back on her now. He twirled in his casing.

"Sorry," he said, twitching. "You'll have to find her yourself."

Exasperated, the assistant took another glance at the hallway. It was dark and sparse, a mixture of blank whiteboards and poorly-done projects and desks. One table in particular stood out from the rest. He pointed to it, at the whiteboard pushed unusually close, at the banner draped over the back edge. The men exchanged a glance then moved toward it.

The conversation dissipated. Chell listened. For a moment, she hoped they would give up and leave—but as the footsteps grew closer, she pressed her fingertips into the tile, shifting onto her toes and into a runner's crouch. If they did find her, she might have a shot at running away.

The man yanked the banner away, and the air whooshed toward Chell.

"Get back here!" Greg lurched, fingers brushing her arm. Beneath the desk her jacket sat abandoned, still scrunched like a pillow.

The 'guard' ducked around the corner, lunging forward to catch the girl's arm. She yanked and struggled, panicking. Sharp inhale after inhale flooded her lungs with air, the hyperventilation evaporating her strength. A moment later, the robot caught up.

"You're Chell?" Greg said. The girl glared up at him, a strand of hair dangling into her face. She didn't answer. She didn't have to—they knew who she was, clearly.

"Come with us," said the guy from security. "Caroline needs to see you." She remained silent, and her lack of response unnerved the two employees.

"Wouldn't want to ignore the boss," the sphere piped in. "Bad things happen when you do that," he said with a half-laugh. "Not that I would know—I've only heard stories."

Greg scrambled for a phone, dialing Caroline's office directly. It rang twice before she picked up.

"We've got her," he said, looking over his shoulder. The brown-haired girl stared at him, unflinching. He adjusted his tie, clearing his throat.

"Good," said Caroline, voice smug. "Take her to my wing and throw her into a relaxation vault. Be sure to keep her quiet, and do _not_ make a spectacle of yourselves. And above all else, do NOT tell Mr. Rattmann."

* * *

Doug glanced over at a monitor that displayed a map of the facility. To the left, a bright blue, stationary dot glared back at him.

Click click click.

Doug tapped his pen against the desk, unsure of what to do. It was still early in morning, and Chell wouldn't arrive from school for hours yet. He figured these should be his most productive hours—after all, he had nothing to distract him. And yet the sheer silence itself, the emptiness of his office, was almost overwhelming. For now, he lingered in the office of one of his few 'friends' in Aperture since talking to Henry was easier than modifying ASHPDs. He tapped a finger on the screen, blue dot disappearing under his thumb. "That's your construct, right?" he said.

"The moron? Yeah," said Henry, lacing his fingers behind his neck.

"He's not moving," said Doug.

Henry dragged the mouse across the screen, hovering over the robot's icon. "Even though we gave him a map, he still gets himself lost," he said, scrolling to zoom in. "Now he's stuck in the Employee Daycare Center. What an idiot." This failure, this inability on their part to create this personality core only reflected poorly on Henry and his team.

"He's just looking around," said Doug, a tinge of defense in his voice, "and you did just tell him to go explore. Maybe that's where he wanted to go."

Henry shook his head.

"We've tried _so hard_ to make artificial intelligence work. But it's not. We're running out of options here," said Henry.

And he was right. The scientists could spend a lifetime figuring out every possible scenario, every improbable situation a robot might face. It still wouldn't be enough. Lines and lines of endless code of code could not possibly adapt to the future the company might face.—

Doug looked up, eyebrows furrowing. The fluorescent lighting hummed overhead.

"We can't play at trying to make something act human. We've got to start from something," he continued. Out of all the things he and his team had learned, it was that artificial intelligence could never match a human life.

"What do you mean?" Doug said, crossing his arms.

"What I mean is that the Disk Operating System—which has been in development for _ten years_, is never going to be able to run this place with the help of an artificial intelligence. We're going to need a genetic lifeform component. "

"Wasn't that already the plan?" said Doug, recalling a stuffy room and hot overhead projector spewing out slide after slide of a poorly put-together presentation.

"I wouldn't know. Caroline's fired everyone on this project countless times. All I have is what people before me leave behind," he said, and Doug knew that that was a longer story he didn't want to delve in to.

Doug wrung his hands. "So what are you going to do?"

Henry rubbed his hands on his legs, then lifted them, palm up, and shrugged. "We can't just photocopy a mind and call it good. It's in the brain itself—in each individual cell and the connections forged between them over a lifetime. We've got to extract it, bit by bit—but we've got to find someone first."

"There must've been someone—on the plans, perhaps?"

"Sure. But Cave Johnson died, and we can't afford to use someone disposable. This is the future heart of the company. They'll be running everything," he said, pausing. From this point on the ethics of this project became, well, shaky. Ripping out minds, prying apart personalities—none of it would be simple.

"We've been looking into what that procedure would entail. It's going to be horrible, though. The process. Painful and ugly and terrifying. Even I wouldn't wish it on my worst enemy—we're on the edge here, Doug," he said. "But I don't know if I want to cross it." He gave a stark laugh, ignoring the growing pit in his stomach. Out of all of the scientists to develop an ethical issue in Aperture, Henry had never considered that it would be him.

Doug swallowed, glancing back at the monitor and at the same blue dot. He could almost picture the bot, alone in the hallway and staring at the row of projects. He cleared his throat.

"Your robot's still stuck," he said, getting up from the chair. The wheels squeaked as he pushed it in. More than anything, he wanted to pretend as if the theoretical science this project was just that—still far off and unattainable, even though he knew it was easily within reach. In fact, he figured that Henry's team already had a plan in development for this.

"I'll go check on him."

He disappeared out the door, heading toward the Daycare Center. He needed to get out of this room, and besides, there was always the slim chance that Chell would be there.

As the scientist disappeared, Henry swiveled. On the screen, the personality construct's dot darted down the management rail, vanishing into the maze of the Enrichment Center. "Wait, Doug—" he said, calling out.

But Doug was already long gone, and by the time he reached the Daycare Center, so was Wheatley.


	8. 15 Acres of Broken Glass

A/N: The first scene here is based off of some concept art for Portal 2. There's a link to it on my profile, and I highly recommend looking before you begin reading. Also, the next chapter might take a bit longer to post up. It's long, and it's important so I want to make sure I get it right. Thanks!

Chapter 8

The bottle came up light and airy in his hands. Doug shook it, pulling the prescription close to his ear and listened.

Silence.

He smashed his palm onto the child proof lid and twisted, popping it open. The bottle was devoid of pills, but The yellow plastic greeted him, and no pills were in sight. He'd used them all, and yet he didn't recall running low. He frowned, glancing up at his Aperture-brand wall calendar. Sure enough, a cheerful yellow smiley face sticker clung to today's date, a not-so-subtle reminder that he'd need to refill his prescription if he wanted to keep on smiling. He slipped the empty yellow case into his pocket, locking his door before venturing out into the facility.

As he walked through the hustle and bustle of Aperture Laboratories, conversations murmured around Doug. The occasional careless laughter or raised voice lightened the mood, as most people spoke in low, serious tones. Many were like Doug, and made the minimal amount of social interaction as they sped from one place to another. And yet the stampede of footsteps and the streams of conversation brightened his heart— he desired these everyday sounds over the sinister silence of his office.

With Chell or without Chell, his lab contained the same amount of stillness. Neither spoke often, and yet the quietness hanging between the two seemed calm. Almost serene. But without her, his office just felt empty. Almost suffocating.  
These people, these sounds provided a much-needed escape, a much-needed relief while he wound his way to one of the most visually-stunning places in the facility: The Aperture Science Medical Research and Employee Prescription Center.

During the early days of Cave Johnson's lunar poisoning, Caroline authorized—well, forced, really— the lab boys to construct a wing dedicated to finding a cure for the CEO's gradually worsening health. As time went on and Cave's body deteriorated past a point of no return, the focus shifted away from a medical miracle to a technological miracle.

Neither of which worked, of course—they hadn't even come close. But the wing had remained in all of its terrible beauty, eventually repurposed and expanded to provide not only research, but prescriptions, free of charge, to all employees of Aperture.

As always, there were those that preferred to buy theirs in town—a much safer source. This was the medical research wing after all, so not all prescriptions worked the way they claimed to. Side effects cropped up frequently—some intentional, some not—though none had yet affected Doug. He couldn't complain—the service was free, and Ziaprazione cost him a hefty amount everywhere else. It was better to take his chances with Aperture's pharmacists.

He cringed at the thought of going without antipsychotics for another day. The confusion between real and not real, between artificial and true was too much to handle alongside his job. If he didn't refill it soon, his mind would begin to lie to him.

Oh, it would be subtle at first, reminiscent of his illness's earliest days. A flash of a figure to the side—a glimpse of someone in a mirror, there one moment and gone the next. Intense, unjustified paranoia. Muffled, indistinct noises around him, originating from no discernable source.

He wasn't going back to those times.

He pushed in the clear doors, and walked into the wing that was made entirely out of glass.

It was open and airy here, a stark contrast to the closed-off offices and cramped test chambers. The area existed within one vast room, though parts of it were sectioned off by transparent walls.

Shades of white and gray drenched the area, with the colors blurring into each other like a chalkboard in a rainstorm. Huge vials and vats littered the ground floor, and catwalks spanned up and up across the open air until they disappeared into a gray haze. Silhouettes walked about, clinging to clipboards and observing bubbling liquids. Things hissed. Puffs of opaque smoke gathered in clouds, and the ventilation system whisked it away.

Three levels up, he saw a splotch of color. Caroline leaned against a catwalk railing, legs crossed. She observed—like Doug, this was her favorite place in Aperture. Her view of the facility expanded past the glass walls, and from this vantage point, high above the twists and turns of activity beneath her, she saw _everything_ in the facility. And for a moment, she could stand here and revel in the fact that this place was _hers._

It was clean; it was crisp; it had Caroline written all over it.

The hair on the back of his neck stood up as he turned to head to the Employee Prescription Refill Center. As irrational as it seemed, he couldn't shake the feeling that the CEO was watching him. He hadn't taken his medicine today, though, and his paranoia cropped up frequently—with or without meds.  
At the prescription desk, the pharmacist filled an empty bottle, scooping out blue and white pills and then carefully counting them. She frowned, and reached into another container before tossing in another handful of capsules.

"Any changes?" said Doug, taking back the rattling bottle of pills.

"New capsule, but same effect" she said, a slight hesitation in her voice. "You might notice slight variations in side effects, but that's to be expected. It's nothing to worry about," she added, a bit too cheerful.

Doug eyed her for a moment before unscrewing the lid and letting two smooth pills roll into his hand. He tilted his head, swallowing them dry—much easier then hunting down a reliable source of water around here. The man remained convinced that, if no one watched, Aperture would lace their water supply with their latest 'research.'

He thanked the pharmacist and slipped the noisy container into his lab coat. As he wound his way back through transparent walls, he glanced up again at the catwalks.

Caroline was still up there, watching, and Doug still couldn't shake the feeling that she was watching him.

* * *

The camera swiveled.

Chell bolted, smacking her forehead against a plexiglass shield. She pressed her hands against it, beginning to panic—she was in a tight space, enclosed in a small sleeping pod.

She couldn't remember climbing into it.

The glass hissed as it slid back, and cold air swirled in. She coughed once, gunk rising in the back of her throat. She raised a hand to rub her sticky eyes, blinking away the chemicals responsible for keeping her asleep.

Her body ached, and a dull headache throbbed—a definite indicator she'd slept for too long. A day or two or three—she couldn't tell. She was still in her sweatpants, she noted, and her t-shirt.

She flipped her legs out of the bed, blinking as she pushed herself out of her cocoon. White overwhelmed her vision. The only hints of color came from the gray-blue tint of the glass and the red lens of a security camera, perched in the outer room's corner.

Slick tile covered the floor, and glass walls enclosed her in a box-like space. Outside of the sleeping pod, a small nightstand, a clipboard, and a toilet furnished the cube. A distant hissing came from far-off in the facility, the result of thousands of parts moving together in a steady rhythm.

A flat white panel stood where an exit should be, the material itself similar to the panels tessellating across the room surrounding her prison cell of a room. A thin gray bar ran across the top, its purpose unknown to Chell. Above it, a broken clock with four dashes blinking instead of numbers.

Chell circled the square room, trailing her fingers along the glass. She sought out an edge, a ledge, a ridge she could latch onto or smash at until she got out of this place. But the walls were slick and uniform with no imperfections.

She was trapped.

* * *

The video feeds cycled, streaming live from three relaxation vaults tucked far away within Caroline's private wing. Back there, no one would find them. After all, if anyone in Aperture could cover up a triple-disappearance, it was Caroline.

She watched the steady rotation from her office, only pausing when a red flash notified her that one of the sleeping pods went offline. She stopped the automatic cycling, and pulled the third chamber up into full-screen.

Caroline smiled—it looked like the youngest of the spies had awoken.

She leaned into her microphone, the action itself reminiscent of when Cave Johnson spent hours recording messages to guided test subjects. But, unlike him, these messages weren't prerecorded—they were one hundred percent live.

"Oh good, you're awake," she said, as nonchalant as she could manage. The fact that the girl was even moving surprised her—she hadn't anticipated she was awake surprised her-she hadn't anticipated that Chell could so easily throw off short-term cryosleep.

The girl startled at the voice, checking the observation window and half-expecting to see Emily standing there. She _was _a test associate, and after what she'd been through she wouldn't be surprised if this had been an elaborate ploy to get her into testing.

"Hold on a moment. I'll be right back," she said, tapping the chipped red record button to stop recording. The communication line cut off with a small pop.

Greg leaned into her doorway, holding a phone at an arm's length and gesturing wildly. "Black Mesa's on the line," he said, hissing.

Caroline nodded, answering her phone with an instant scowl.

Her assistant wandered in, hovering by the video feed. In his career at Aperture, Greg had dealt with test subjects and unending amounts of testing-related paperwork, but he'd never seen a test subject that young. Not that she was _young_, per se—a quick glance showed her to be on the verge of a teenager. Compared to the old hobos waddling through testing, though, she was definitely youthful.

She didn't sport the standard orange jumpsuit, but seeing the girl in short-term storage worried Greg. Sure, he had spent hours hunting her down, but seeing her in her sweatpants, huddled against the harsh white of the chamber made her seem so small. Vulnerable. He couldn't see why Caroline felt so _threatened_ by this girl— or what could have warranted such drastic measures against her.

He blinked, refocusing on the CEO's conversation.

"Those weren't the real files, you know," she said, standing. She placed a hand on the sleek hardwood desk, steadying herself. "They're useless-You can't get anywhere with a single portal device, you know. Besides," she said, fingers curling around the smoothed edge, "you've got a hurried description from an idiotic employee. You're honestly bragging about _that?_"

Greg considered picking up a receiver to listen in, but thought better of it. A move like that would get him fired.

"Stop gloating and forget about those files," she said, other hand clenching around the phone. "It's not worth it—and I can _promise you_ Black Mesa will never build a portal as well as Aperture."

She thanked them in a disgustingly cheerful voice, but slammed down the phone to hang up. Caroline braced both hands against the desk, staring down through strands of disheveled hair. She trembled slightly, and Greg took a hesitant step back and glanced again at her monitor. She said nothing, and instead taking a moment to compose herself and smooth her dress before walking to her assistant.

"A little young, isn't she?" he said, voice small.

"Black Mesa got a working gravity gun thanks to that girl, and with the help of her parents, they've had their first glimpse into the mechanics of a quantum tunneling device," she said, giving one choked laugh.

A dull blue glow from the computer illuminated half of Caroline's face. "They've got enough for one portal, but if they finish developing that technology, we're finished. And _she_'s to blame, and I could care less how old she is."

"What do we do now?" he said.

She folded her arms. "I have the girl, and I have her parents. I'm going to make sure that Black Mesa never attempts to steal that technology from us ever again, and their little spies are going to pay the price. As far as what to do," she said, "well, I'm still deciding. But I've got _lots_ of time for that."


	9. Maybe Black Mesa

Chapter 9

Maybe Black Mesa

The first time Black Mesa called her, Cave Johnson was days away from death. They'd called Caroline's office directly—one of the most effective ways to get _her _undivided attention. Cave's line was always far busier than her own.

She spoke for hours that day, letting her work pile so high that it took her the rest of the evening to catch up. And even then, she went through work in half-daze, unable to push the conversation from her mind.

She listened to the other end for a long time, lips pursed, before she softly thanked them and hung up.

* * *

Soft whirrs and mechanical clicks spun around her as she wove her way through the medical wing of Aperture. She paused at a door, pressing her hand against it.

She listened. Inside, she heard the distinctive boom of Cave Johnson's voice.

As his voice shattered into a coughing fit, Caroline swallowed once. She struggled to relax her face, to maintain the façade of control as she pushed her way in.

"Go on. Go. That's not working, so you might as well get out of here and start fixing it," he said, pushing away the electrodes attached to the side of his head and tossing them at two lab boys. "We're running out of time," he said. They didn't move. "Go on, you heard me. Out."

The scientists scrambled, shoving the experimental brain-mapping equipment to the side of the room and then shuffling out. Caroline closed the door behind them, turning back to face Aperture's CEO.

"Caroline!" he said. "What a joy it is to see your lovely face." Caroline gave a pained smile. Seeing him so pale and gaunt and sickly made it hard for her to stay cheerful. He was a mere shadow of the man he had once been.

"Sir," she said, pulling at a folder tucked underneath her arm. She slid out a few papers—charts and reports and estimates— then cleared her throat. On the bed, Cave punching at his pillow and shifting to better see his assistant. He winced, then noticed the stoic expression replacing her normal smile.

"Sorry to interrupt you, sir, but there's a problem. I've just gotten the latest reports, and they're not good," she said, showing him a jagged chart, lines plunging downward—Aperture's earnings in the past year.

"Caroline, science doesn't care about money. You know that by now."

"You put us in debt by over $70 million dollars," she said. "Sir, if we don't pay back that money, they have every right to shut us down. We're not going to have a company anymore."

"Quit worrying. We're not going to shut down the company —we'll find a way. We always do. There's gotta be something we can use. Those lab boys are always working on something."

Caroline paused, sifting through her papers. She rubbed at the back of her neck, then adjusted her scarf. While normally the staple of her wardrobe felt comforting, today it felt choking. This conversation wasn't going to be easy, and she had to play her cards right.

"Well," she said, "Just listen to me for a moment. I do have an idea, but you're not going to like it. "

"Caroline, nothing you say could be worse than this disease."

She paused, pulling in a breath. "You know Aperture's never been good at making commercially successful products. Repulsion gel, propulsion gel, turrets. For years, our only moneymaker's been shower curtains, and even those sales are down. We're in debt, and our contracts have tanked—"

"Get on with it," he said, breaking into another jarring cough. " I'm well aware that Black Mesa's left us with no incoming money. Damn those fools."

"That's just the thing, sir," she said, pulling out a new chart. "They're reporting record profits in recent years."

"That's because they've stolen everything we've made!" he said.

"Exactly," said Caroline. She paused, watching his face. While blank at first, it twisted as he began to put two and two together and guessed where this conversation was going. Caroline talked faster, not wanting to be cut off before she finished. "They've stolen from us for _years_, and they haven't even taken that much, considering what we've invented. They've taken our technology and improved it and then made _tons_of money off of it."

"Your point?" he said, giving her a searching look.

"Imagine if they _paid_ us for that. Those inventions—all of this science we have, just laying around. Being useless. But they can use it-and we can keep developing things because they'd be paying for it. Just _imagine_ what we could do if we didn't have to worry about money."

Caroline pulled back, letting a heavy silence fall over it. This wasn't her idea, of course. Black Mesa gave her a simple enough proposal—Aperture made discoveries and invented things with no real life applications. Black Mesa, on the other hand, couldn't develop anything new to save their life. This had locked the two companies into a parasitic relationship, with the number one science company sucking the originality of the number two science company and morphing it into commercial success. If Aperture went bankrupt, so would Black Mesa. But with this partnership, Black Mesa would pay off their debt. And as long as Aperture left their research up for grabs, the bigger company would continue funding them-on one condition. The quantum tunneling device remained the sole property of Aperture.

While she had no problems with the rest of the plan, she told them that she wouldn't take the deal unless they made this exception. Risky, yes, but she couldn't let the tunneling device fall into their hands. All that Aperture did these days was testing. And every day of testing was a good day for science.

She hadn't agreed to it, though—after all, only the CEO could authorize that decision. But at this point, Aperture had two options—go bankrupt and close down the company, or accept Black Mesa's help. But if she hadn't acted as if the idea had been her own-if she had just told Cave about Black Mesa's proposition-he would flat out refuse it. He wouldn't see that it was their only shot at survival. But if his assistant, well-loved and well-appreciated, suggested the idea, there existed a slim chance that he would listen to reason.

"Caroline," he said, sinking back into his bed. His voice was soft and deflated, so different from the sheer energy and passion of previous years. "Did you just ask me to sell out to Black Mesa?"

Her hands curled around her papers. "We don't have any other choice, sir," she said, not making eye contact.

"Like hell we don't," he said, shifting again. "We've been running this company for _years_ without their goddamned help, and we can get along fine without it. We'll get through this, Caroline. I wouldn't have bought those moon rocks if I didn't believe Aperture might have another shot at glory."

"Sir—" she said, hesitant.

"Look, we haven't been successful for a while, but we're changing that! We've got better test subjects now, thanks to some of those robot employees we made. And, we're making _leaps_ in brain mapping," he said. "I've told you before— Artificial Intelligence is the future of tomorrow. It's too late for a medical miracle."

"But sir, we're getting closer to finding a cure in the medical wing. The lab rats are dying at a slower rate than they used to be."

"Look, the lab boys in here before have been working on me. Hooked up some electrodes, ran me through an MRI. Shocked me once or twice, but I didn't care. We're so close to figuring out brain mapping. I can feel it."

She shifted on her feet.

"I know what you're thinking—but Cave! You've only got weeks to live! know. But if the lab boys can't digitize my brain by the time I kick the bucket, I'll make sure it's done by the time you do."

Caroline turned back, walking to a cabinet and pulling out a familiar bottle of pain pills.

"Look, I know it's hard idea to get behind—not everyone would want to be uploaded into a computer—I'm not even sure what it involves. But if any of us can run this facility for the rest of eternity, it's you."

"I couldn't sir," said Caroline. "I have no wish to live forever." She twisted the handle on the sink. Cold water streamed out, bubbling in the little paper cup she held beneath. With two white pills curled in her other hand, she walked to the CEO's bedside and handed him the pain medication and water.

He swallowed, brushing the corner of his mouth with the back of his hand. "Even if you're not crazy about the computer idea now, I _still_ want you to run this place after I'm gone."

"You're sure?" she said.

"Are you kidding? You've been at my side since we first opened our doors to the world. It's only fitting for you to be the one to keep holding them open even after I leave. No one else even comes _close_to you. I'd have signed over the company over years ago if I didn't like being in charge so much. You're the backbone of this place."

She couldn't argue with that. She knew she was by far the most qualified, and so did every other employee in Aperture. Sure, Cave's charisma motivated everyone to do science, but Caroline made sure everything didn't explode. She deserved this, and she knew it. She just wasn't sure if she could handle what came with the deal.

"Promise me one thing, though," he said, between coughs. Caroline cranked the faucet and poured another glass of water. He gulped down half of it before speaking again.

"Keep doing what you're doing. Make me proud, and make this place great again. I'm counting on you."

"Don't worry, sir," she said, with a slow not. Cave struggled as he pulled out forms sitting on the desk beside his bed, dropped off earlier by one of the more legal-savvy employees. Like any other Aperture contract, it had warning images, disclaimers, and unreadable fine print. It threw Caroline off. She expected naming a successor to a nearly bankrupt company would be easier. But then again this was Cave's contract-of course he would make it complex.

Pen in hand, she scoured the document for anything binding she might later regret, eventually finding it under a discreet subsection. It explicitly stated that in order to be the CEO of Aperture Laboratories, Caroline must also agree to participate in the Genetic Lifeform and Disk Operating System development project.

She clicked her pen, staring up at the man and shaking her head.

"I know I'm not going to make it out of this. But I've got to know that you're going to be okay. It's the last wish of a dying man," Cave said, and Caroline's heart ached.

He was so weak. So sick. So delusional. She couldn't refuse that, when the peace of knowing might make these final days of his easier. She couldn't take that chance and refuse-not if it sent his health even farther down into the pit.

She caved, dragging back the paper and swooshing her name across the paper.

* * *

A week later, Cave Johnson died.

In the days following, when everyone left her alone in her office-to give her space, to let her mourn-she picked up her phone and called back Black Mesa. Cave would have wanted this. He would've wanted science to continue no matter the cost, even IF it involved requesting help from their hated rival.

Of course, Caroline worked out the details. She'd be given full and uncensored knowledge of any spies sent over from there. She would assign them jobs, spreading them throughout the facility but keeping a close eye on them all. And above all else, the quantum tunneling device remained Aperture's secret. In fact, she arranged it so that if any Black Mesa ever attempted to steal that technology, she had every right to do whatever she wished with them. Torture, testing, research—anything. Their lives would be in her hands.

The opposite held true for Aperture employees within Black Mesa—but Caroline wouldn't have to worry about that. _Her_ company would never stoop to that level, and even if they did, it would only be one or two. Nothing like the hordes they would surely send in.

Yes, it was strictly against Mr. Johnson's last wishes, but company must stay alive. He was dead. She was CEO. And she still had science to do.

* * *

The lights never shut off.

Hours passed. The days shifted into nights. But the lights never flickered. Bright and unending, they offered no clues as to how much time had passed. Chell guessed it had been at least a few days. Food appeared every so often, usually whenever she dozed off.

She refused to use the pod to sleep. Opaque outer shells. Tanks attached to the back. Ever since she'd woken up in one, every part of the sleeping pods terrified her. They _could_make time pass faster, but part of her worried that if she fell asleep in one again, she wouldn't be able to snap out it for a very long time.

But the boredom was beginning to get to her.

A few times a day, Caroline visited. Sometimes she spoke directly from her office, but other times—in the evenings, when she could roam without interruption-she sat in the observation room and spoke through a different microphone.

Chell laid on the cool ground, tracing patterns in the cracks in the tiles. Her hair spread around her like an open fan.

A small pop from the speakers. An instant anger singed through her, churning her stomach and covering up the smallest twinge of relief. As angry as the lady made her, she almost didn't mind the company. Almost anything was better than being alone.

"I wanted to thank you, by the way," said Caroline, leaning forward in her desk chair. "Couldn't have done it without you—I've been waiting for an excuse to catch your parents for years. But something's not right."

Chell continued scratching at the floor, attempting to look disinterested.

"I know every Black Mesa employee that works here. And I know that none of them in their right mind would ever consider going near the ASHPD. At least not any that valued their life. So why did _you?"_

The girl remained silent, still curled on the floor. Though tile was less comfortable than the pod, here she could retain a sense of control. Here, she dictated when she fell asleep and when she stayed awake. The few times she couldn't bring herself to stay alert, she'd

let herself fall into a sleep for as short of a time as she could. With Caroline still on edge, she didn't dare to sleep longer.

But judging by Caroline's horrible mood and horrible attitude, the transfer of ASHPD plans to Black Mesa must have been at least partially successful. She'd gotten the files out—this might actually work. Her mom might get her dream job. She'd finally realize that her daughter was worth something—Chell might finally get to go home.

"You took such a big chance. So why did you call—" Chell heard the sound of a flipped page as Caroline scrambled for a name."—Judith Mossman? Why not the Black Mesa Research Facility_?"_

"She's my mother," she said. "She doesn't work for them, but she will now." A hint of a smile crept onto her face

"Hold on," Caroline said, realization dawning on her. She shifted in her perch—she should've seen this before. "_I_see what's happening here. You thought this would actually work, didn't you?"

Chell looked up, neck twisting to get a better look.

"Hate to break this to you, but adoption's a permanent thing. She _removed_herself from your life," she said with an almost smile. "You though she'd take you back. Give you a second chance. And you did something no one else was stupid enough to try."

Chell pressed her palms against the floor and pushed herself upright. Her arms trembled, and her head spun as she propped herself against a wall. Though still trapped within a glass box, She claimed one small triumph—she'd gotten those plans to her mother. The adoption wasn't as permanent as Caroline had made it sound—it was all just arouse less suspicion, and to legally confirm her as the Naransky's daughter. All of it was to avoid something just like this from happening—but even now, she might get to see her mother again.

"And I thought you'd like to know," said Caroline. "The call I intercepted was placed directly to the Black Mesa Research Facility."

Chell inhaled sharply, bright white dotting her vision. No. She hugged her knees tighter, eyes closing. She was wrong—she had to be. "But they called her," she said. "I dialed her myself."

"They hung up as soon as you left the room," she said, voice calm and cheerful. "Your mother didn't answer," she said, almost thoughtful. "But tell me—did your 'parents' ever show interest in the ASHPD _before_ you befriended Mr. Rattmann?" She paused to gauge the girl's reaction. So naïve. So clueless. She couldn't see what was written so plainly in the way her 'parents' had acted.

Chell's eyes drifted upward as she remembered back. "I don't think so," she said.

"Did you ever stop to consider that helping your mother wasn't the goal of Jerry and Emily at all? Going near the ASHPD _is_ completely against the deal, after all."

Chell clenched a hand. She knew that she and her parents were spies. Their entire goal was to steal things. And in an information-heavy setting like Aperture, Caroline couldn't expect to maintain total control. She couldn't regulate what the spies stole, and what they left alone—that wasn't how it worked.

"You're not getting it," she said, placing a hand on the glass. "Here, since you can't get it through your thick skull, I'll spell it out for you: _theyused_ _you as their scapegoat_."

She met the woman's eyes for a brief moment, confusion evident in her look.

"Oh," Caroline said, corners of her mouth upturning. "They didn't tell you, did they? Well, it's a well-known, but hushed fact amongst Black Mesa 'spies,'" she said, air quoting the last word. "They can sneak around and 'steal' Aperture technology—which I suppose isn't thievery at all, to be honest, when they're paying us for it—but the tunneling equipment is off limits," she said. "That was the only thing I'd agree to. As long as Black Mesa's presence and purpose remained secret from my employees, and as long as they gave me _full reign_ over those who crossed the line and tried to steal Portal technology anyways, I let them stay. But they didn't tell you that, did they?"

Chell fell silent, absorbing what she'd just learned. The two companies—they'd been partnered all along. Her and her mother had both been pulled into this grand idea, this grand scheme that none of them could actually pull off. She wasn't even a real spy—and now, she was in real danger. According to Caroline, now Aperture had every right to claim her life for science. No wonder they hadn't stopped Chell from leaving to grab her jacket. With her out of the picture, they could leave her to take the fall. They could grab the gun and make a run for it—Chell would be enough of a distraction, considering it was _her_ who was friends with Doug in the first place, and she'd been the one to break into his office.

And by then, the damage had already been done. The first call—even unanswered—was enough to link Chell to her mother, and by extension, Black Mesa. And that's all someone like Caroline needed to grab them, especially when she was the daughter of two known spies.

"You've got to admit, it was pretty well-played. Even I didn't see it coming."

"You got them, right?" Chell said—though her parents could've taken the gun and run for it, the fact that Chell was still alive—and Caroline even speaking to her—was enough to reassure her that they'd hadn't been able to pull it off.

"Sure did."

She knew it—they hadn't pulled it off. Calling directly to Black Mesa had been the nail in that coffin. They'd blown it. Though her breath shook and her eyes watering, the most brief of smiles crossed Chell's face. Caroline saw it, too, and she felt herself smile. Twisted, this girl was—though not so different than herself.

But then the full scope of everything she'd done, everything the adults had done came rushing back. Things could've been worse—but they were in enough trouble already.

"If you think that company's going to save you, forget it. You're as good as dead to them—they won't even notice you're gone. Even your scientist friend here hasn't noticed, but I'm not surprised. He didn't even know you were stealing from him."

No. She was wrong. Doug would realize something was wrong—she hadn't given any explanation for leaving. This facility was huge, and even Chell didn't know where she was. Doug would come looking for her. He'd find her.

Wouldn't he?

"You might as well accept it. You're not leaving this room—this facility—until I say so. And you're going to be here for a long time."

She trembled, eyes watering. She blinked once, twice, biting her lip and glancing away. The lady was right—it had been days already. Doug had forgotten her. Her mom gave her up. Her 'parents' threw her to the wolves. She was a complete and utter failure to everyone she loved—she wasn't worth saving. No one would be rescuing her.

The lady was right. She couldn't depend on anyone else. If she wanted out of here, she'd have to save herself. Chell sniffed, face hardening as she twisting once again to stare at Caroline.

"Oh, don't give me that," she said. "I don't think you understand—when we were at our worst—over 70 million dollars in debt, CEO dying from moon poisoning, I saved this company, because I knew that science must continue despite the costs. All of this—it's going to waste," she said, gesturing past the chamber walls. "My company. My facility. And all because of _you. And you're not even sorry."_

The speaker fell silent.

"Do you even know what you've _done_?" Caroline said, then pushed away from the microphone. But there was nothing she could do now—what the girl had done was already done. No undoing it. No chance at getting Black Mesa to hand back their partial plans.

A coffee stain on the desk caught her eye, and Caroline traced the half-circle with her pinkie nail. Memories of Cave came flooding back—of his face turning red as he insisted again and again that Caroline not sign over Aperture to Black Mesa. He crumpled up every paper she handed him, balling it up and chucking it into the trash. Hours later she fished them out, smoothing them so she could try again later.

And Caroline still ignored him and sold the company regardless. Science must continue. That's what she had told herself for years.

But this—was it even science?

She thought back to Cave Johnson, about what he might have done—but she couldn't compare herself to him. Leaps and bounds were made in portal technology thanks to him, even if the exposure to the conversion gel killed him. After his death they'd found a vaccine, and now it was a requirement for all new test subjects. He had—quite literally—given his life to science.

And Caroline was still alive.

She knew this wasn't right—and yet, she couldn't bring herself to free the girl. Caroline had always claimed that, like Cave, all that she did was for the good of all the company. But this didn't feel right either.

She looked back through the thick window. The girl had shifted, turning her back to the window and pushing herself into a corner.

Caroline couldn't see the girl's face—but then again, she didn't need to. A flick of a switch, and video feed from one of the room's cameras would be instantly available. But she didn't need to. She moved closer to the glass, hand resting on it.

The girl was shaking, shoulders moving up and down. In the brief moment Caroline had looked away, Chell had stated crying. Sobbing. She curled up into herself, attempting to muffle the noise with the crook of her arm. But her attempts to muffle, to hide the noise only amplified it.

A wicked sort of delight coursed through Caroline as the choked sound drifted through her speakers. She pivoted, heading back to her microphone. She couldn't miss an opportunity like this—especially when the girl had been so unresponsive in the days before—Caroline must've struck a nerve.

Her finger lingered over the microphone's button for a long moment. She paused, then drew back her hand. She couldn't do it—she couldn't press the button. This girl had been strong for so long, and Caroline had been impressed by it. But now, after hearing so much—she was scared. Hopeless and lonely and terrified. And she had a golden opportunity here. She could descend on the girl and make her cry harder— and on any other day, she would have done it in a heartbeat.

But she could bring herself to do it.

And yet, she couldn't bring herself to do it. She glanced away, eyes falling on a radio. It sat on the corner of her desk, the sheen surface reflecting back the bright lights. Caroline reached for the room's phone and dialed her assistant—one of the few that knew about Chell's situation.

"Tomorrow, when the girl's food is delivered, throw in a radio. One that works. Don't ask why—just do it."

Releasing the girl, Chell, was out of the question. But maybe, just maybe, there was something Caroline could do to make the passage of time just a bit more bearable.


	10. Master Hacker

Chapter 10 - Master Hacker

Flick.

Doug blinked.

Huuumm.

A split-second delay.

Lights flashed on in the Employee Daycare Center, and Doug scanned the empty room.

Desks. Chairs. A clean floor. He paused at the door, then took a few steps in. Each desk chair was perfectly pushed in, and each computer keyboard was set parallel with the monitor. All stray papers, all stray writing utensils had been stashed away.

It was the cleanest he'd ever seen this place.

And yet, none of Chell's things were here. He looked for them—a backpack, a stack of half-completed homework and a crumpled candy bar wrapper with one square of chocolate still tucked inside—none of it was here. Gone. Vanished. As if it'd never even existed.

He crouched for a moment, letting one hand rest on his knee and the fingertips of the other hand pushed against the sick floor. From here, he could see underneath all of the desks—one look told him that there was nothing else under there.

Riiiiing. RiiiIIIING.

A shrill tone sounded from the wall-mounted phone, and Doug jumped back to his feet. He briefly considered letting it ring out, but decided that the sheer volume at which it was ringing was more torturous than actually answering the phone.

"Doug?" said a male voice—Henry—as he answered the phone. The scientist nodded, then, remembering that Henry couldn't see that, squeaked out a "Yes?"

"Knew you'd be there. You didn't answer your office phone."

"Yeah, just came down to grab something I left. Have you been down here recently?" he said, eyes sweeping across the unusually spotless room.

"No," he said. "Why?" Doug heard conversations in the background, and then a muffled sound as the man on the other end readjusted the handset.

"Chell's stuff is gone."

"They left on a month's vacation. Of _course_ she stopped by to pick up her stuff."

"It doesn't make sense, though," said Doug.

"Bet she picked it up earlier and you just never noticed," Henry suggested, but the scientist frowned.

"And clean up the entire room? I don't think so," he said.

For two weeks, he'd seen so sign of Chell nor her parents. As far as why they'd disappeared, he'd heard two popular theories: they'd quit, or they'd taken a sudden, month-long leave. Vacation, the more optimistic ones said.

But it didn't add up. Quitting Aperture required a two-week's notice, which would've given Doug plenty of warning. They could have been fired—he'd heard that one floating around as well, but it had been true it would have blazed through the facility like neurotoxin through an empty chamber. Though firings at Aperture were common, it remained humiliating and if they'd been gearing up for vacation, Chell would've talked about it—or, at least mentioned it. He could never tell if travel would ever again be a source of excitement for her.

"Look, it doesn't matter. You can stop walking over there every day—it's not like you're going to find her just sitting there," he said. "But while you're down there, though, I need your help. That robot's stuck."

"Again?"

Henry made a rather annoyed sound of agreement. "When you're done there, go check out the Neurotoxin Implosion Observation Annex. Get that robot away from the toxins."

Doug nodded, agreeing. Henry hung up a moment later, leaving Doug once again alone in the room.

It was entirely too clean in here—and it felt as if all of the clutter had been stashed. The floors were swept, and Doug rubbed his fingers on a desk and they came up clean. Dirt free. Someone had deliberately cleaned this place, and someone had removed every last trace of her from this room. A vaguely unsettled feeling grumbled in the pit of his stomach. He exhaled. Perhaps Henry was right—stopping by an employee daycare center every day wasn't something he needed to do. Chell was gone, and if her lack of backpack meant anything, she wasn't coming back.

Wherever she was, whatever she was doing, it didn't matter. If she wanted to speak to Doug, she'd stop by his office. She knew where it was, and he didn't need to keep coming back here and looking for a face he didn't expect to see.

At the doorway, he pushed his palm against the all three bays of light switch and plunged the room into darkness.

* * *

A soft blue glow caught Doug's attention on his way to the Neurotoxin Implosion Observation Annex. The personality core's rail suspended over the edge, and yet the robot itself paid Doug no mind as he hovered beneath it.

He wasn't surprised. The engineers saw no need to waste time developing empathy towards humans in their fully artificially intelligent constructs. They cared little about humans, but that didn't matter. The robots couldn't be held accountable for ethical violations, especially since their sole function was to do science and nothing else. People couldn't get away with that, and Aperture saw no need to 'fix' this problem.

And, as theories and plans of genetic life-form-based AIs surfaced, the problem became less and less of a concern. No point wasting money teaching a computer how to handle humans—a future genetic life-form component would have that covered.

"Need help up there?" Doug said, craning his neck upwards. He could've sworn the robot jumped a few inches on his rail.

He spun around, small pupil darting from side to side before glancing down and locking on to the human. "Oh. Er, hello down there. Didn't bother to say 'hi' now, did you? Gave me _absolutely_ no indicator that you were standing there. Right behind. Just jumped right into conversation."

"You know, you can't get across there," said Doug, noting how the management rail dead-ended. "Back up and go around."

Though only extending part of the way across the open pit, the robot seem convinced that—if he banged on the end of the rail hard enough—it would extend across to the opposite side. Clearly this was not the case. But it hadn't stopped the sphere from trying to do that for the past two hours.

The robot's top shutter drew down. "Well yeah, that's the _easy_ way. Far too simple for this complex brain up here. Plus there's far too many people in _that_ direction," he gestured toward Doug with the lower handle, "just jumping out and scaring me. Like_ her_."

Doug glanced at the robot. "Who?"

"That rude girl. Short. Silent. Scornful. Was just reading some _fascinating _science projects, minding my own business, and she jumps out! Scares me half to death, and then tells _me_ to quiet down." His optic bobbed. "Selfish, really. Shouldn't have scared me like that if she wanted me to be quiet. Honestly," he said, swooshing past Doug's head as he reversed his way back through the management rail.

"Wait!" he said, grabbing at a handle. "Tell me what happened." The girl had to be Chell—no other person in this madhouse of science would fit that explanation—and yet he wondered in what context those two would have spoken. What could Chell have done to make the robot dislike her so quickly?

"So after she scared me, I was standing there, trying to talk to her, but a couple of very official-looking men stopped by. Looking for her. Very official. Lots of credentials." The robot's optic drifted upwards, and he gave the most deep-in-thought expression he could manage. "So I told 'em, you know? Said where she was hiding."

"Was it security?"

"Ah...no. Going to go with no." His voice wavered, and he gave an unconvincing shake of his head. "The boss lady wanted to see the girl, and I wasn't about to get in _her_ way," he said, ignoring Doug's protests. The man tightened his grip on the lower handle, staring the robot in the eye. It had a tough time making eye contact with the scientist, eye darting every which way and yet never meeting Doug's eyes. He said nothing, knowing fully-well that the robot would continue talking if left uninterrupted.

"She stared them down, then tried to run away, but that did not end well," he said with a small chuckle. "Oh, she was _livid._ Both of them. Boss lady and the girl."

"But why?"

He gave the robot equivalent of a shrug, bobbing up and down on the management rail. "No idea. Would _not_ want to be her though, heh."

Doug pressed his thumb nail against his tooth. Panic struck him in the chest, full-on and overwhelming. Chell was still in the facility.

She'd never left.

But for the life of him, he couldn't think of a reason why Caroline herself would take such an interest in her. At least, one that involved sending down a makeshift security team.

Unless...

He pulled away from the robot, glancing back over the ledge. As the facility expanded upwards, Aperture's engineers began to play a dangerous game of Jenga. Panels extended. Rooms balanced on top of each other. Pipes and walls merged together in a twisted mess of worn metal and concrete beneath their feet.

"Hold on. You have a map of Aperture built into you, right?" he said, mentally flipping through areas of the salt mine. Testing tracks. Offices. Hiding them in this place would be impossible. They'd have to be somewhere else. Somewhere he wasn't familiar with.

"Though it is _bloody _difficult to read," the robot said, nodding.\

"Look, is there anything in there that says 'Keep Out?'"

"Never stopped me before, those signs," he said. "Well, this _rail_ goes just about anywhere, to be honest. Ah, hold on. I see it. There to the left. Lots of 'Keep Out' signs there. Wait. I shouldn't be looking at this—God, I'm going to get in trouble for this, aren't I?" The robot blinked once, twice, then continued. "Says it's Caroline's wing. Never seen it before in my, err, life. Existence. Whatever it's called. Time spent as a robot. As me. "

Doug shook his head, rubbing his hands together. The puzzling situation had shifted into a dangerous one. An entire _wing_, free from employee's eyes. Horror stories bubbled to the front of his mind—tales of unethical experiments and even a few covered-up deaths for disappeared employees. Doug had no idea how hard this might be to navigate, but Chell had been here fora few _weeks._

He needed to find her.

And he needed to get her _out _of here.

He glanced at his watch, tensing at the time. Late afternoon. Though Caroline tended to stay close to her office or cling to the research areas, he—along with the rest of the Aperture staff—had no idea where she disappeared to in the evenings. But now, he could make a pretty good guess.  
A few hours. That's all the time he'd have to explore Caroline's wing for a vanished Chell.

"Let's go," said Doug, throwing an arm over his shoulder, beckoning the robot. "Your map. Which way?"

"Ah, well, it's not too far from here—just keep going to the right for a _very_ long time, and you'll hit it. Quite literally, if you happen to be running—it's a, ah sudden stop. Watch out for those doors. _Doors. _Probably will be locked, though. Good luck with that, mate."

The robot hesitated, then sped to catch up with Doug and lifting his lower handle as to not bang into the man's skull as he sped ahead.

The halls grew plainer. Simpler. But the layout grew more labyrinthine. The entire wing had an eerie, deserted feel to it. Unlike other places in Aperture, there were no scientists, no robots—just non-portable surface after non-portable surface. A few times the scientist took a wrong turn and felt a sick sense of disorientation until the bumbling robot backtracked and guided him in his technically correct yet roundabout method of getting from point A to point B.  
A solitary door came into view, just as plain and simple as its surroundings. A keypad sat bolted above a handle. It was small and unassuming, like his own keypad. Not at all like other locks in Aperture.

"That's, err, problematic," said Wheatley. "I _hope_ you know the code."

"No," he said. "We'll have to start at the beginning—keep track of these numbers."

"Got it. Remember all the numbers." The robot nodded. "All of 'em. Easy enough. ALready know zero through nine. Shouldn't be hard to keep track of combinations of those." The robot swiveled. "Exactly _where_ are are you starting?

His fingers brushed the tips of the bubbled buttons, lingering before pressing down.

In the upper right corner, a light blinked red. His shoulders lowered, and he tilted to face the robot.

"Zero-zero-zero-zero," Wheatley narrated. "Ah, well, worth a shot. A valiant effort. Only 9999 more combinations to go."

Doug gave a solemn nod, moving on to 0001, then 0002, and on and on and on until he reached the 1000's.

Crack.

Doug pushed his hands forward, pressing them against one another and listening to individual knuckles pop. Wheatley continued jabbering away, his chatter an unbroken stream of ramblings. Doug pushed in the next code.

"Spinning." His pupil circled around, bumping against his side plates."Fun. But I do _not_ recommend stopping. Everything's still, ahh, twirling. Even though I stopped a while ago. Real world's taking a bit to catch up. Just a small programming problem, I'm sure. It's nothing that you couldn't fix. You know, next time you're prying open my side and messing with my processors."

Doug rubbed the hardened tips of his fingers. Pressing plastic-coated buttons over four thousand times didn't come without consequences.

"Ey, you about done down there? Stay here much longer, and that human's going to send someone. Make sure I'm not _stuck_ or _lost_. Not reasonable at all, really. It's not like I get lost _more_ than twice a day. "

The scientist double checked his watch—the robot, as much as it pained him to admit, was right. As evening approached, the chances of Caroline discovering them skyrocketed. She'd be out of her office soon, roaming the halls of science with a silent grace and vanishing into an area so secretive and so tucked away that he hadn't believed in its existence until Whealtey's map confirmed it.

At the most, he had an hour.

But even Doug didn't want to cut it that close.

"Just a few more."

Whispers danced on the fringes of his hearing—and even with the artificially intelligent bot watching out, he couldn't shake the overwhelming sense of paranoia that clung to his side like a snail, slowly inches its way higher and higher.

He blinked, reminding himself that he'd taken those meds today. None of this should be happening, and yet it still couldn't help but wish his schizophrenia wasn't so _persistent_—lurking in corners, fleeting in and out of his daily functions like a passing thought. But even the strongest medicines science had to offer could never completely subdue his lurking illness.

Numbers danced on the keypad, rising up and changing colors. Doug's index finger retracted as he stared at the numbers in question—a one, a three, and a five.

And though he was only at 1044, Doug skipped ahead over a hundred numbers on a whim.

One-one-five-three.

"Wha—what _are _you doing?"

Click.

The light flashed, then blinked green. The lock clicked, popping open the door so slightly that Doug lunged for the handle to make sure it didn't slip closed and relock.

"Ha!" Wheatley said. "Made it through. Didn't let any old combination stop us. We're a proper team now, you and me. You're doing the number-guessing thing, and I'm doing the, well," he said, making a sound as if in deep thought, "watching out part. Lookout. That's what I am. A lookout. Best one there is.

He creaked open the door, pausing to listen. Whispers still lingered, rising in intensity like a gust of wind through an empty room. He pulled it open farther, propping it open with his foot and glancing down the bright hallway.

Wheatley shot forward on his management rail, gathering speed as he rocketed ahead, only stopping when the hallway split. Though identical in both shape and construction, he turned left. It wasn't a particularly scientific method, but he wasn't doing science here—just trying to find someone in an endless science facility.

"So what _exactly_ are you looking for?" Wheatley said, optic continually shifting and unable to remain still longer than a few seconds. He never focused on Doug's eyes, and instead kept shifting his focus from his left eye to his right eye.

"Not sure," said Doug softly.

"_You're not sure? _Why'd you bring me along, then? I have honestly _no idea_ what we're doing back here, but I do _not _ like it, I assure you—hold on, is that another locked door? I'll, err, get ready to remember some combinations. Go on, go for it. Just make sure you don't take _too_ long—we're already about to get caught as it is doing this-this break-in thing—_what's _it called again?"

Doug glanced up. "You should know that. You're a computer."

"Ohh. Well. That's insulting. I'm not some dusty old mainframe here. Far superior. Intelligent, that's what I am—even though it's, ah, artificial. Real enough to me, though," he said. "And I still have no idea what that thing you're doing is, but I'm sure I can figure it out. To save some time, though, would you mind just telling me? A simple word would do. Or two."

"Hacking?"

"Ahh, brilliant! So _that's_ what it's called. Hacking. Need to try that sometime. Pick up some skills. Bet I'd be good at it, too. The best hacker. A master hacker," he said, body jostling as he nodded. "How—how exactly does it _work?"_

Doug gave him a blank look, and then exhaled. "You _just_ watched me do it," he said, but the artificial intelligence only nodded again and stared at him with a wide-eyed and expectant look.

"Might as well see it again. Doesn't hurt," he chipped, voice cheery.

"Well, if you know the person, it doesn't hurt to guess at their code. You know, easy stuff. What normal people put as their passwords. But," he said. "If none of those work—and you've got a lot of time—start and the beginning and run through each possible combination. Much easier on a computer, where I could just build a program to do some of this for me."

The robot nodded again, watching Doug intently as he punched in four zeroes.

The light didn't flash. The lock didn't click. And one look at the door's upper right corner showed that this door's lock was disabled.

He jiggled the handle. Rattle. He pulled again, grip firmer. It slid open.

"Ah. Nicely done," said Wheatley. "First try, too. Impressive. Writing that down here. Door access code—" he announced, the sound of pen scratching against paper coming from his speakers. "Zero-zero-zero-zero."

"No, it's not that," said Doug. A mental image spun to the forefront of his mind as he pried at the side panel of the keypad, a picture of his own keypad, easily disabled with a correct code and a few internal tweaks. The memory of him and Caroline strolling down the hallway, of him laughing because for once the cold CEO had made a joke and been—for a fleeting moment—_human._ Caroline was just as lazy as he was, if not more so.

Doug smiled as he pushed his way in, fingers trailing on the door's cool metal.

After the first unlocked door, about half of the subsequent rooms popped open with a twist of the handle. It made sense, of course. This was Caroline's wing, and it would be impractical for her to lock each and every door. A select few knew the key to get in—and as long as she kept the exterior doors locked, it was redundant to enable he interior ones, especially along her most-commonly traveled paths.

"Pretty good team, you and I?" said Wheatley, but the scientist moved on and twisted doorknobs. Like the way he found the combination, there were only a certain number of rooms, a certain number of hallways and dead ends he had to go through until he found Chell.

"You wouldn't _believe_ what's back here!" said Wheatley, voice growing increasingly louder as they progressed without an encounter. "There's an _entire_ testing track up ahead! Madness. How could she even hide 19 chambers back here?"

"Hold on," said Doug, ducking into a nondescript office. "Are there any vaults in there?"

The robot clicked as gears grinded in his head. "Ah, well, there are _plenty_ of observation rooms—though I'd stay away from those. Too visible. No guarantee of who might be sitting there, watching. Or who might show up," he said. "Well, there's a little row of extended relaxation rooms to the right, and a few short-term vaults pulled away from the testing track entirely. Only looks like…one's active, though. Imagine that. All these chambers for testing and so few test subjects. Rest must be in long-term storage."

"That's her. That's got to be her," said Doug, darting from the room. The robot sped ahead, fully ready to lead the scientist onward. They'd gotten a map, a destination, and now they had a motivation.

All they had to do was get to her.

* * *

A/N: So sorry for the delay! Real life got SO busy for me for a couple that I barely had the time and brainpower to write ;n;. Now that it's summer, though, things will be back to normal!

Oh, and the number 1153 spells out cake on my phone's keypad, so that's why I chose that number :3

I also forgot to make clear that in the last chapter, the radio that Caroline gives Chell has more than one station. It was meant as an act of kindness.


	11. The Escape

Chapter 11 - The Escape

"Turn left!" said Wheatley. "No, wait! _Terrible idea. _Your other left!"

Doug reached out to grab a corner, rebounding in the other direction like a snapped rubber band. Panel after panel whooshed by him, the white of his lab coat blurring with the white of the walls.

"Hurry up, hurr-y up!" called the robot, hushed yet urgent. "_She _could be here at any minute. See us lurking about. Sneaking."

He frowned—he _knew_ that she could be anywhere. That's why he stayed silent; that's why he ran instead of walked. The further they went, the more terrified he became of coming face to face with Caroline herself.

The panels pulled away. Doug rushed across empty space, a long gap separating the previous area from the next one long. A quick glance back showed the testing track he'd just passed. Elevator tubes connected each chamber, extending up in a vertical stack. And ahead of them, Doug spotted the short-term relaxation vault.

Disconnected from the tests, it hung in the haze like an ornament from a tree. Black panel 'arms' jutted out. The circular chamberlock remained twisted closed. The catwalk ran alongside it, wrapping around to the other side.

"Entrance, entrance. Looking for an entrance," the robot hummed. "Don't see one. Anywhere. Besides, ah, that one hanging over that drop."

"It's there," Doug said, pointing out a dark door.

The robot jerked his handles, discovering it out a split-second too late. "You can't just _go _in there, though," he said. "Specifically told you that before: do NOT go into the observation rooms. You know fully well that she," he said with a gulp, "could be in there. I'm nothing to her. Just a pile of processors. I could _die_. "

"Then you'd better go in there and make sure it's empty."

Even if the room was occupied and Caroline strode out, Wheatley had a history of finding himself in places where he didn't belong. He could pass it off as an accident. A misunderstanding. He 'didn't mean' to end up knocking on the door—and if he was clever enough, Wheatley could make up an excuse for how he'd gotten in there. Perhaps the 'door' had been standing wide open.

_That _would send her rushing off in a panic.

"Go on. Just hit your handle against the door," he said, ducking around a corner and pressing his back against a wall. "I'll wait over here."

Wheatley's upper eye plate lowered. With a sigh, he glided onwards.

Knock.

Knock knock knock.

Nothing.

He couldn't glance around the corner. He couldn't tell what happened. So, he listened for the things he expected: a telltale creak of the door, or Caroline's bright and terrifying voice.

He really should have picked a spot farther down to hide.

"Hell-ooo?" the robot called, and Doug jumped. It took him a moment to place the source of the voice—he could have sworn that the turret-like phrase came from behind him. This place was messing with his mind.

Silence.

He heard the metallic glide of the sphere as he rolled back. The expression on the bot itself had shifted—while confused and worried earlier, he looked more cheerful now.

Doug couldn't explain how.

He wasn't sure if he wanted to, either. Describing to someone just how an artificial intelligence could have _emotions_ would be difficult enough, much less arguing that they had expressions as well. Like everything else, they'd brush it off as another symptom of his schizophrenia—assigning human-like qualities to objects. Intelligent objects, yes, but still not human.

"Absolutely no one in there. I knocked, and even said hello. No one answered," he said. "I'd say with about seventy percent certainty that there's no one in there. But there is a slight chance that the boss lady's gone completely deaf, being as old as she is. In that case, I would _highly_ suggest that we run for our lives."

Doug took one last sweeping look before approaching. His hand trembled as he twisted the door handle, barely cracking it open. He ducked down, peeking in through the minuscule slit between door and frame.

Just as Wheatley had suspected, the room was empty.

He opened the door, pushing his way past a faded yellow desk chair. Squeaky clicks came from the wheels as he rolled it aside.

A mug sat on the desk, rings of brown staining the surface. Doug pressed his palm against it, noting that no heat came from the slick surface of the cup. He dipped his index finger into the ice-cold coffee, jerking it back and splattering a few drops onto his shirt.

Caroline wasn't here. And she hadn't been here for a while.

It took him a moment to snap out of his hyper-focus on details, to shift his mind back to finding Chell.

He struggled to look through the thick, lined glass that warped his vision of the room below. Face pressed close, he raised his hands above his eyes as if to shield them from a bright light.

A small figure perched on top of the curved relaxation pod, her back pressed against the wall facing him. She fiddled with a radio, twisting a knob and jumping through stations. Little numbers dashed, and the tunes clashed into one another. Soft strains of a cheerful song came through a speaker in the corner.

"Chell!" he said, loudly yet not quite a yell.

She didn't turn around.

He tried again. "Chell!"

No reaction.

He slapped a hand against the glass, window only hearing a muffled thump as the window deflected his hit. He hit again, this time bouncing his fist off of the glass. "Come on," he said. "Turn around."

No reaction.

The spherical robot lingered in the doorway, hesitant to enter. Adding Wheatley to the already-cramped room could only cause more headaches.

A desk. A chair. A coffee mug. Doug swept the room once again, eventually settling on a box beside the computer monitor. He reached for the small gray thing, tugging at the attached cord so that he could hold it in his palm.

An intercom—an old-fashioned version of the intercoms he'd seen around Aperture. He punched at a red button, clearing his throat and tapping on the mic as he turned back to the glass.

* * *

Pop.

Hisssss.

A finger tapped on the microphone.

Chell lunged forward, letting her radio clatter onto the floor. She scrambled back into place, throwing a fearful look at the camera in the corner. There was no way she'd ever let Caroline know how much she loved the radio and the break from monotony it provided. She couldn't allow her that satisfaction.

The sheer isolation caused her mind to conjure things into being, voices and shapes and dreams she knew, in hindsight, couldn't be true. One moment there, then gone. But after she'd gotten the steady streams of music from the radio, the—hallucinations, for lack of a better word—stopped.

Another day must have passed. Caroline was back, and it was time once again to listen to her hurl words from the safety of her perch.

A voice came in over the speakers, low and _male_. At first she heard her name, broken and faint. Then, louder and with more confidence. Her heart leaped, and she twisted, pressing a palm against the unbreakable glass of the vault. She'd tried throwing everything at it—a clipboard, a nightstand, herself, but never the radio. It meant far too much to her.

She looked up to see a young man pressed against the window, drenched in Aperture white.

"Doug!" she said, breaking into a smile.

He nodded, and the fact that _he_ was here instead of Caroline, though, made her anxious. The part of her that wasn't filled with relief remained convinced that something horrible could happen at any moment.

"Hold on. I'm getting you out of there."

Chell slid from her seat, scrambling into her shoes. She didn't bother to untie her double knots, instead shoving in her feet. The back of her heels folded in and dug into her feet.

Doug lifted his finger from the live button, turning back at the robot lingering in the doorway. "Help me get her out of that room," he said.

"Can't really help you there. No real _door_ in there. Just portals. And unless you can get into that computer, I cannot help you. Most likely a complicated password, with both numbers _and_ letters. Could be here for days hacking that one."

Doug wiggled a mouse and a lock screen surfaced on the computer monitor. Two empty slots blinked at him. Username. Password.

He got the feeling that his standard employee login wasn't going to cut it.

The robot was right—they didn't have time to sit here and go through every possible combination. If anything, he might make a lucky guess. If only there was some sort of admin login, some sort of code that could access even her network of computers back here.

Doug exhaled, glancing back into the sealed-off room only accessible by portals.

"Can I access those directly?" he said, pointing toward the portal panels. Little bars stretched above and below, and produced a twin set of portals when activated. No gun required.

"Of _course_ not," said Wheatley. "What, d'you think Aperture just has some sort of 'Press to Open Portals' button? Ah-hahaha aaha aah _oh,_" he said, dropping into a lower, softer voice.

Doug readjusted the bulky white monitor, revealing a warning poster and a small, singular switch.

CAUTION

Do NOT disengage inter-dimensional portals when subject is inside!

THANK YOU!

The diagram was split in half, with two different scenarios. On the top, the portals were open, and the switch on the side flicked to 'on'. A test subject smiled as he walked between them.

To the right, a bright checkmark.

Below it, the switch on the side changed to 'off'. The portals were disengaged, and two halves of the man laid on the ground in a pool of scribbled blood.

To the right, a large X.

What a _terrible _poster.

Inaccurate, too.

In his time—and even before his time, developments in the handheld portal device ensured that test subjects would be pushed either one way or another when portals were disengaged—both manually or remotely. Too many test subjects had ended up split into pieces due to a careless error.

While Aperture was never against death as a result of testing, there were far too many other, more creative ways for them to stupidly die. At least those mistakes contributed to science-.

Doug almost missed the white paddle switch beneath the poster. He stuck his index finger underneath and flipped.

Sparks.

The lights in the chamber dimmed, and then brightened. Chell backed up as the timer flickered to life.

1:00:00

0:59:00

0:58:00

0:57:00

Doug pressed the button. "As soon as that portal opens, you get out of there," he said. "I don't know how long it'll stay open."

Chell nodded, dipping her head as she approached the flat portal panel.

"Not to, ah, _rain_ on your parade," said Wheatley. "But someone—not entirely sure who—just opened one of the doors into this wing. If I had to guess in some sort of life-or-death scenario—which I seriously doubt would ever happen—I'd say it's her. So, a friendly reminder to hurry up with whatever you're doing in there, because she could be here soon. Very soon."

Doug's heart jumped—forty-five seconds left on the clock. He could get her out of the vault itself, but he had no idea how to get her out of the chamber. The only exit dropped off into empty space, and with no access to the computer he had no way of changing that.

Forty seconds.

Doug moved to the window, strumming his fingers against the glass.

What to do, what to do…

He turned back to Wheatley. "Get in here," he hissed.

"Oh, I _really_ shouldn't—" he said, but after a glare he darted into the room. Doug ducked under the sphere, pulling at the door handle and closing the door.

Doug wasn't sure how much the metal ball could endure in terms of damage. That's what Henry's department, not his. But he could think of two possibilities.

One, Wheatley was incredibly fragile.

Two, Wheatley was indestructible.

In Aperture, there was no in between. But judging by how dense this robot could be, Doug would have put money on the latter.

Only one way to find out.

Doug reached and wrapped a hand around Wheatley's lower handle.

"Ahh, so you _are_, in fact, trying the computer hacking thing? Not entirely sure we have time for that, but you _are _the employee here. Not me. So I'll trust your greater judgment. Assuming you have some."

"Disengage from your rail, Wheatley."

"That's an awful long ways down, though—"

His hand tightened on the handle and he glanced up. "I've got you," he said. "Don't worry."

_Thwop._

The portals opened, and Doug glanced over. The girl darted through the portals, undaunted by the fact that she'd just leaped through an inter-dimensional tear in time and space.

With his other hand, he reached for the microphone. "Stay back from the window!" he said. "I'm going to try something."

The girl backpedaled, sizing up the distance from the floor to the observation room. Even if he broke the glass, she wasn't sure if she'd be able to get up there. With a portal device it would be easy—but Chell couldn't blame Doug for not having one. The devices themselves had to be under close watch, considering what had, well, happened.

"You've got quite the grip there, you know," said Wheatley, yammering on. "Excellent. You won't let me slip. I'm sure of it. Might as well just drop now and save some time."

_Pop._

Wheatley dropped from his rail like a boulder into a pond. Doug's arm lurched downward with the unexpected weight of the sphere, and he gave a little yelp as he scrambled to readjust himself.

The sphere rolled to the side, groaning slightly. "Ow," he said as Doug grabbed both of his handles. "Could've at least warned me that you weren't actually going to catch me…"

Doug hefted up the robot, backing up to the wall. And with all of the strength he could muster in his arms, he flung the robot at the window.

_Crash._

The robot sailed right through, leaving a circular shaped hole. A moment later it shattered, glass raining into both the office and the chamber below. Doug threw up his arms to shield his face, but the danger had already passed.

He dropped his arms.

Jagged bits still clung to the window frame, glass teeth waiting to draw blood. On the ground below, the sphere wobbled, complaining as he tried to get away from the piles of sharp fragments.

"Well THAT was quite the hack!" he said, rolling to look back up at Doug. "I like your, ah style there, mate. Need to take a few tips from the master himself. When computers won't work, might as well attempt a full-on manual override. Genius!" His handles pulled inward and then back outward.

Chell wormed her way toward the broken remains of the window, tiptoeing her way to the wall. She reached up an arm. Her heart sunk-she hadn't realized just how _far_ down she was.

Doug stared down, scanning the room for something, anything they could use.

"Grab that nightstand—" he said, and Chell darted back into the vault with only a split-second hesitation at the portals. She pushed it against the side, throwing her arm up once again with fingers outstretched.

Still no luck.

"The—use the robot," Doug said, and Chell reached out for the artificial intelligence.

Her heart stopped.

_This _was him. This was the robot responsible for her being in here, for her to have been caught in the first place. If he hadn't shown u, she might have had a chance at getting out of here on her own.

"Why is _he_ here?" she said, face darkening.

"Look—I'll explain later," said Doug. "Just—use him as a step for now."

He looked so much bigger in her arms, and Wheatley raised his lower plate into a pathetic half-smile.

Chell dropped him onto the nightstand, optic first. His handles caught him, balancing the sphere on the flat surface. She scrambled to stand on him, once again going up on your toes.

"I know this can't be helped—we are in a hurry. Just, could you be a _bit_ more careful? Really, please do be careful. I'm not indestructible," he said.

Doug yanked off his lab coat, tying one sleeve to his ankle and another to his desk. He leaned over the edge, metal frame biting into his stomach as he reached out to her. The jacket pulled taut, and he heard the faint sound of seams ripping as his hands closed around her outstretched ones.

He dangled. Arms fully extended and legs locked straight, he gave a halfhearted pull and realized with a twist of his stomach that he couldn't do it. She was too far down—and he couldn't get in a good enough position to yank her up. Upper body strength alone wasn't going to work.

Doug muttered a quick apology, slipping his hands away. Chell searched his face for an explanation, but the man had already turned away. He yanked at the knots, pulling both of his sleeves back to normal.

With one sleeve now wrapped around his hand, he tossed the jacket down to Chell. He couldactually pull her up, now that he had proper footwork and a makeshift rope.

"And _how_ exactly do you plan on getting me back up there?" Wheatley said, piping in.

Doug didn't answer.

And neither did Chell.

The girl clung to the tips of his white jacket, her grip shifting into handfuls as she climbed her way up. She hovered, glancing down at the tilted robot. He'd rolled on the nightstand, twisting so that his optic faced the ceiling.

"Wait. We can't let Caroline find him," Doug said softly. "You'll have to grab him."

Chell gave Doug a long stare and then sighed. Her foot swooped down, pointed as she stuck it between his handle and his casing. Chell flexed her foot outwards, letting it stick out at an angle as she drew the robot closer to her.

He was heavier than she'd expected.

As soon as she climbed high enough, she reached for the window ledge and let go of the fraying lab coat. Years of hot summers, of pushing herself out and over pool ledges whenever she was too lazy to swim to the ladder meant she had enough upper body strength to heft herself over the edge.

"Got it?" said Doug, reaching out to grab her shoulders. Chell threw a leg over the edge, pointing her foot to let Wheatley roll aside. Bits of glass jabbed at her stomach, tearing and ripping stripes into at her clothes and drawing red lines on her skin.

She scrambled, glass shards snapping as she rolled to safety. After pushing herself to her feet, she pulled her shirt down to cover the rips in her undershirt and brushed off clinging squares of glass. There. Good as new. A smile broke out on her face, a burst of color and expression in this emotionless place.

"Thank you," she said, almost a whisper. He could never know what had gone through her head, how truly frightening that sense of total abandonment had been. She could've gone crazy in that room, left alone to her thoughts. And he—he had proved her wrong. People _did_ care about her.

Doug gave her a small pat on the shoulder. "You're welcome," he said, "but save it. Caroline's on her way and we have to get out of here. And don't worry about the robot. He's helping us now."

Her smile drifted into a more serious expression, a thin mask to hide her terror. Doug reached for the sphere, standing up on his tiptoes to latching him back into the management rail.

"Oh—this is very, _very_ bad news," said Wheatley. "Can't tell quite where she is at, but she should be arriving here at any moment. So I would suggest we start running. NOW."

"Then go!" Doug hissed, diving beneath the robot. No sense in standing here any longer—the room was trashed. No chance of covering up this one—he couldn't just readjust the swivel chair and walk right out as if nothing had happened. It was only a matter of time until Caroline realized what had happened—and that she was missing one test subject.

Chell paused to close the door before sprinting to catch up. The robot zoomed ahead, darting left to take a new route. After all, they didn't want to risk running into _her _on their way out. Especially since she'd most likely come in the same door as they had.

The two might have been hurrying on their way in, but it was nothing compared to how fast the three were going on their way out.

They struggled to remain silent, shoes slapping against metal and breaths deep and heaving. Another door came into view, just as plain and simple as the first entrance. Doug punched open the numbers, giving silent thanks that the code for exiting matched the code for entering. He threw the door open. Chell and Wheatley slipped through.

The elevator to the surface wasn't far from here—just a few more winding hallways, past a few more offices. Five or six people stood around, chattering amongst themselves.

They slowed to a walk as they approached, chests still heaving as they squeezed their way through and pushed the 'up' button.

"Press all you want," said one of the scientists. "We've been here for ten minutes waiting. They say it's stuck."

"You're kidding," said Doug, but the other man shook his head. He took a deep breath, glancing at the closed doors and wishing that they'd just _open,_ that they could slip in and glide up to the surface.

A tense moment passed.

He glanced back at Chell, her face the same stoic expression. She refused to make eye contact with the sphere. "Come on," he said, voice hushed. "Caroline must've called and had them block the lift. I think I know another way out—just trust me."

"I do," she said, voice soft. "Just please. Don't let her find me again."

"I won't," he said, pulling the girl into a hug. She only made it about three quarters the way up on him, and for a moment she just rested her head against him, breaths steadying. "I won't let her find you," he repeated, the hug itself reminiscent of his mother pulling him into a hug when he was younger.

"Just follow me," he said, pulling away. Chell blinked twice, wiping a palm across the corner of her eye.

No alarms blared through the intercom. No security 'guards' rushed out to grab them. No test subject had ever successfully escaped from Aperture. Caroline could deal with it herself—plus, she couldn't risk exposing anything about her own wing. So even if she had discovered Chell's escape, they could never know for sure.

Doug heard murmurs of discontent as they pushed their way back out of the crowd. Chell reached out a hand to cling to the back of his lab coat. Wheatley whizzed ahead, taking a few sharp and incorrect turns before relinquishing leadership to Doug.

There—at the end of the hallway.

A dated elevator hummed in place, a few dimmer lights illuminating it. It was an old-fashioned lift, and one that could only take them into the lower levels of Aperture. It wasn't the surface lift, but it was a lift nonetheless.

With only one elevator in and one elevator out of Aperture, Caroline couldn't stop it forever. They couldn't leave now—they didn't have a choice. But at the same time they couldn't stay in the modern Enrichment Center.

She'd find them in a matter of hours.

Doug pressed a button, breath held as the elevator creaked to life. Wheatley hung a few feet down the hall, unable to progress any farther on his rail.

"Guess I'll just let you two go, then," he said, glancing down. "Though it has been fun. All of that hacking. Escaping."

The elevator doors slid open. "

"Don't mention any of that," said Doug. "Understand? You never helped us. You never 'hacked.' And you definitely didn't lead us anywhere. If anyone asks—you just got lost."

The robot gave a cheerful nod, and Doug reached up and gave the bot a pat in the same way he would give a dog a pat on the head. "Good job with your hacking, though. You really saved us back there."

Doug could have sworn that the robot beamed. For once in his life, the artificial intelligence had done something _right._

The elevator clicked again, and Doug and Chell slipped inside. He pressed a button, watching it light up and the doors closed. Strips of light danced across the walls.

They descended.

* * *

A/N: Hoping to get chapters up quicker now that it's summer.

ALSO, Cakeybots on tumblr drew a FANTASTIC picture of Caroline based on a bit of dialogue at the end of Chapter 8. I will be putting up a link to it on my author page!


	12. Tier 3

Chapter 12 - Tier 3

Lights flickered by.

Chell and Doug centered themselves in the unusually square elevator. Metal grating wrapped around the bottom edges, but no gates covered the slipped into open space as the facility above them disappeared. Unsettling clicks filled the elevator.

"No one knows this place better than Caroline," said Doug. "But there's got to be somewhere we can hide you." Even though she hadn't been to certain areas in decades, he had no doubt she could easily navigate these halls of science.

White walls and ledges closed in around the elevator shaft. They creaked to a stop a few levels beneath the bottom and stepped out, twisting around the corner and passing beneath yellow block letters.

Two thousand, nine hundred and seventy-five meters beneath the surface.

Another turn.

They found themselves in a perfectly lit office, perched above a y-shaped air duct. The lights remained on in the abandoned office, and Chell wondered why the brilliant yet clueless Aperture Engineers had never considered installing power switches. Or, a backup power system triggered by motion much like the prerecorded messages.

"Should be a straight shot from here," he said as they walked through the office. "And I think I know just the place." He opened a doorway on the far end, and a rocky ledge extended out. A gated walkway extended out. They edged across the open platform, and then clung onto the catwalk's railings.

Chell paused, peering over the edge. The walkways shifted into square, yet downward spiraling staircase. Catwalks jutted out on every level, connecting to testing spheres or offices.

And from their position at the top, the gaps between made a perfect Aperture logo.

They descended past each sphere, the empty spaces even more vertigo-inducing than the elevator. Their hands clung to both hand rails. Chipped paint rubbed off, clinging to their palms as they dragged their way along.

Though taking a few elevators would save time, Doug knew this would be the most direct path downward. Better to bypass the testing track altogether than attempt to navigate it in reverse.

Chell made a point to keep her shoulders back and eyes ahead. The adrenalin from running and escaping had worn off. And with their pace slowed to a walk, the details of her surrounds came rushing in. Only a thin rail separated her from falling to her death.

"How much farther?" she said.

"Just the next level," he said. He'd never ventured this far into Aperture before—he'd had no reason to. No point in getting lost in the complex twists and inconsistent layouts of the earlier decade sections.

They'd descend to the lower 70's section. It only made sense. Even if Caroline worked her way through the decades, she'd most likely start at either the modern levels or the bottom of the facility. Better to stash Chell somewhere in the middle. It'd take her longer to find her that way.

But he couldn't think like that. He needed to figure out a place where Caroline wouldn't find her at all.

"There," Doug said, pointing at where the elevator shaft joined with the staircase. "Should take us the rest of the way down." The catwalk split to the right, dropping off where an elevator should be.

Chell's grip tightened as she glanced at the empty, cylindrical frame. A testing sphere hung directly below them, the first one in the testing track. And if she peered down far enough, Chell could make out the faint outline of buildings.

Doug pressed a green button and called the elevator. A few moments later they'd descended, and then exited onto another catwalk. Two buildings clung to the side of the salt mine, the upper portion of the lower labeled CONTROL ROOM. Chell followed him onto a unstationary platform that slid over to the higher building's entrance.

Just like every other office she'd been in, there were only desks and chairs and outdated computers. "So why here?" said Chell, unsure as to how she could hide _here,_ of all places.

"Seeing if there's any truth to a few rumors," he said, moving along the walls with pointed motions, as if searching for something. He paused at a vaguely technological, refrigerator-sized box. Chell didn't know what to call it, but Doug pushed it aside to reveal a dark metal door. It slid apart, opening up to a rocky tunnel built into the side of the salt mine itself.

Four closed-off doors greeted them, each labeled VITRIFIED. Every door looked strong and sturdy, as if they could withstand multiple explosions and remain intact.

And yet, none of them were locked. Doug peeked into the first three before letting the doors slam shut.

"Aha," said Doug as he pushed open the fourth door. "This is it. The _Borealis_."

Chell ducked in beneath his arm, taking slow steps. Doug slipped in. The door clicked closed. She turned to him, looking for an explanation.

It made no sense to have a boat over four thousand meters beneath the surface. She wondered why they had even built it in the first place, much less how they planned to get it to a body of water.

But there was a ship.

In _Aperture._

It extended far above them, massive and looming. Crates and wooden boxes dangled from cranes. Metal beams crisscrossed, and the structure itself seemed barely balanced in its dry-dock. Chell got the feeling that if she so much as breathed on it, the ship would topple to the side.

"An experiment in large-scale teleportation," said Doug, hopping over the railing and trailing along the concrete walkway. "But the small-scale tests with human subjects were…problematic. Never even tried using it with the ship. It's been sitting here ever since, I guess."

"And I'm hiding in there?" Chell craned her neck, studying the ship. There'd be enough places in there to hide in there, among the dark corners and nooks.

Doug shook his head. "Too unstable," he said. "Too dangerous to walk onto there. One careless move could trigger it and send you who-knows-where."

The color blue clung to the ship and dry-dock, tinting the area like steam on a mirror and concealing a staircase at the far end of the dock until they were a few feet away. They ascended toward the new door, and Chell couldn't help but notice that it looked as if the _Borealis _builders had simply slapped on a leftover door.

An automated message blasted on as they walked in. Chell's hands flew to cover her ears.

"Welcome to the Aperture Science Nuclear Fallout and Supply Shelter! If you're hearing this, then those damn commies dropped a bomb somewhere around here. But you can count your lucky stars," said the recording of Cave Johnson. "I've already thought ahead. Each and every section here at Aperture is equipped with enough food and water to sustain the entire professional population of this company. For about a year. Now, you might wonder just _why_ the food won't last longer. One year's not nearly long enough for radiation to clear. But food's expensive, and I know that your bright minds will figure out how to build some sort of anti-radiation suit and let us return to the surface.

"Meanwhile, though, go grab a can of beans and make yourself comfortable. Just be sure to share with a friend. Make it last as long as it can. And please, don't dirty up the place. It's brand new."

Chell pulled her hands away. Floor to ceiling shelves extended up and down the huge room. White cans sat on top of one another, and jugs of water refracted back the light. Cave was right—and even though the place had to be over twenty-five years old, it remained in pristine condition.

Doug glanced around, then motioned toward a far shelf stocked with books and puzzles and games. "Those'll keep you busy. Should be some beds and a bathroom back there."

Chell grabbed a generic can and examined the expiration date. Hmm. Still edible.

"I hate beans," she said. She placed it back on the shelf, twisting it slightly so that the label perfectly aligned with the other cans.

"Chell," said Doug.

"What?" She looked up, expression flat.

"We _did _it."

She gave a slight smile, then looked away.

"Wait. You don't understand. No one's escaped from a testing track. Ever. Much less from Caroline's track," he said. "And we walked right out from under her nose."

"I guess we did, didn't we?" she said, smile growing. Emotions crashed into her. For the first time in days, she sunk to the floor and relaxed.

She began to laugh.

At first it was just a few laughs, but then Doug joined in. She laughed and he laughed and they fed off of one another. She couldn't stop. Tears came to her eyes, partially from her giggles and partially from sheer relief.

A few minutes later, they faded. Chell wiped the tears from her eyes, taking a few deep breaths.

"Been awhile since I laughed that hard. But I don't think anyone heard us," said Doug.

She paused, turning over the situation in her mind like she'd turned over the can minutes ago. Even if Cave was right—even if other rooms like this existed, stashed away on each level, Doug had no guarantee that they'd find one back here.

"How did you find this place?" Chell said.

"More of a lucky guess than anything. Call it a hunch," he said. Doug stood, examining the shelf and then glancing at the door. He sighed.

She stared at him, last traces of laughter disappearing. It only took a moment to realize that he was moving toward the exit.

He rested a hand on the door.

"Doug, stop," she said. "Don't leave."

"Chell—" he said. "I've got to get back up there. If I'm gone too long, she'll know. She'll come looking for me. She'll come looking for you."

"Please, just stay. I don't want to be alone again." Her voice cracked.

"I can't," said Doug. "You know I can't. Just lock the door and don't go anywhere. I'll be back soon."

"But wait—" she said, voice soft. "I have to tell you something." He had risked so much, just by going back to rescue her. He deserved to know that she was no victim of this. He deserved to know that she'd stolen from him.

"What?"

Her mind blurred together, and she chickened out. She couldn't risk it now. No, she'd tell him once they got out of here. That would be better for both of them.

"It's nothing," she said. "Never mind."

"You can tell me later," said Doug, pushing open the thick metal. "I've got to go—but before I leave, I want you to know this." He locked his elbow, propping open the door. "You've been so brave. And I want you to know that I couldn't be more proud."

* * *

The box scraped across the ground.

Doug gave a final kick to the filing cabinet, pushing it in front of the sliding door. Better to stack a few boxes and divert stray eyes from this door. Anything helped when it came to keeping Chell hidden.

He didn't bother stopping by the Control Room to turn on the power. He didn't have to worry about a reserve power grid running out and plunging Chell into darkness. A nuclear core powered the facility, and so every area linked to it had an almost limitless power source.

His steps marked staccato notes on a musical scale as he moved through Aperture. Soon enough he found himself up several flights of stairs and back at the beginning elevator shaft.

But it was empty.

Doug clung to a railing, peering up and into empty space. The elevator must have defaulted to its original position in upper Aperture. He searched the walls for a switch. Instead, he found a sign advising him to wait for an attendant.

He sighed, knowing that the rooms twenty-five feet below him no doubt had the button. Even after walking countless flights of stairs, he still had a few left to go.

A creak and soft swish.

He pushed the door open. A hallway opened up to a larger, sectioned room. He wound his way through cheap folding chairs and cheesy posters. A blank projector screen sat above a small platform, a black logo stamped in the middle. A waiting room for test subjects—that's what it had to be.

Though judging by the vicinity of the elevator, Doug guessed it to be for subjects after successful completion of their testing course. It'd explain why the room still seemed spotless.

Two slick and dark gray doors sat on the far side, thee-quarters of the way closed. Doug slipped a hand between and pushed. The doors retracted into the walls, much like automatic grocery store doors.

To the right of the doorway sat a detached observation room. In these massive chambers, viewing rooms tended to sit against a wall. Inside, he spotted a control room. Two desks, two computers, and two windows.

This must have been where the lucky test subjects got their reward from testing, and this must be where the elevator controls were.

He clunked forward a few steps, and Cave's voice roared over the speakers.

"The point is: If we can store music on a compact disc, why can't we store a man's intelligence and personality on one? So I have the engineers figuring that out now. Brain Mapping. Artificial Intelligence. We should have been working on it thirty years ago. I will say this - and I'm gonna say it on tape so everybody hears it a hundred times a day: If I die before you people can pour me into a computer, I want Caroline to run this place. Now she'll argue. She'll say she can't. She's modest like that. But you make her. Hell, put her in my computer. I don't care," said the recording.

Doug froze.

_Hold on._

Memories prickled at the edges of his mind, memories of Henry lamenting over their inability to find someone worthy enough to pour into a computer and run Aperture forever.

Not once had he heard them mention Caroline. But listening to this—he couldn't help but wonder if that had been the plan the entire time.

He scrambled up the steps and into the observation room, triggering another message.

"If you're a test subject, get out of here. You've got your sixty dollars. Go on. Leave."

Doug took another step.

"Sorry about that. Just had to make sure not just anybody hears this message. At least I know Caroline won't be in here, heh. For as much as she loves testing, she wouldn't be caught dead this close to those grimy, disgusting beings we call test subjects," Cave's recording trailed off, the disgust evident in his voice. "If you're still here, test subject, and your name happens to be Caroline—well, congratulations. Now get out. You're not my Caroline, and I can't have anyone with that name in this room."

He coughed a few times, then continued.

"Been thinking even more since that…rant. I went ahead and copied all information related to that project onto my computer. Caroline's already gone through it. Not much there now. She's taken everything useful. Hell, she probably has all of this already. But point is, I have no guarantee that she won't turn around and delete every last bit of after I—" he swallowed, then cleared his throat.

"After I die. But that's where you come in, Aperture employee. I'm going out on a limb here and leaving you my username and password, because science must continue. These two words should get you into any computer system here, old or new. Cjohnson. Tier3. Trust me," he said, breaking into an coughing fit. The message cut off, pulling the room into quietness.

Doug reached for a keyboard, punching in the username and password with deft keystrokes. He scooted into a desk chair as the system loaded.

A single folder sat on the desktop, simply labeled 'Trash.' Doug clicked, the sound loud and clunking on the older mouse.

Another folder sat within, labeled 'Really, it's useless information.'

Click.

'You're wasting valuable company time.'

Click.

'Back to work, slacker.'

Click.

'I swear to God. If that's you, Caroline, you're fired.'

Click.

'I mean it.'

The icons exploded as the last folder opened. Documents and charts and reports filled the monitor, each one related to the GLaDOS project. More specifically, the Genetic Lifeform component of the it.

Doug scrolled, skimming titles until he found one labeled 'Overview.' He clicked and dragged to the desktop, then double clicked.

_Despite what anyone says, it's too late for me to go into that computer. I can barely type this, much less allow my mind to be transferred into experimental technology. _

_I don't know what she'll say. I don't know what lies she's undoubtedly fed you. I know she wants no part of this project, and if she's still the Caroline I know she'll fight against it until her dying breath. But you HAVE to make her. I don't want her to die like this. Like me._

_ She's legally bound to go into that computer—it was my only condition for her takeover as CEO. If you ask her, she'll tell you she could never do it. That she wasn't worthy enough. That she could never handle that responsibility. _

_A load of bullshit, if you ask me. She's probably already running the place—what's so different about running it from a computer specifically built for her?_

The document extended for pages, slipping into caps lock halfway through. The poor voice in Doug's head read it in an enraged scream. He had to stop, blink and look away every few paragraphs until his mind quieted.

He spent the next half hour finishing the overview, and then sifting through the other files. He couldn't help but be struck by just how important they were—and how much of Aperture's future had been hidden away.

These documents were _crucial._

Cave Johnson had been absolutely right in his predictions—and these files proved that Caroline had been hiding it for years.

Doug logged off the computer and called the elevator, tripping over his feet to get into the other room.

He had to tell someone—everyone, if he could.

But first, he needed to find Henry.

* * *

A/N: You may have noticed that the first chapter of this fic is quite a bit shorter. That's because I've retconned the first half until further notice because of continuity errors later on. Sorry!

As always, thank you for reading!


	13. Three, Two, One

Chapter 13

"Caroline."

She jerked from her half-asleep pose on her desk, red marks staining her face from where she'd leaned against her hand. She'd been up all night waiting, and this dip into her already-minimal hours of sleep ebbed away at her temper.

She glared at her assistant as she slipped her shoes back on and readjusted her jacket. She wasn't angry. Far from it, actually. He just happened to be the only one around.

Her rage was a mere gust of wind compared to the hurricane it had been earlier. Opening the door to see the light sparkle of shattered glass and an infuriatingly cheerful radio chime into a deserted vault had _pissed her off._

Escape from a testing track was impossible without outside help, and a rewind of security footage pinpointed just who had dared to break into her wing.

She had to hand it to Doug—his exploitation of her security had been flawless and their escape would've been admirable, if not so poorly thought-out. Her camera was zoomed in on the inside of the vault itself, and sat on the same wall as the observation window. Reviewing the footage only yielded the sound of shattering glass, and a fleeting image of Chell darting away.

She'd picked her way through the shards of broken glass, gingerly lifting the telephone to call her assistant.

It only took three words to get this situation back in her control.

_Stop that elevator._

With some educated guesswork, she realized they'd left for Old Aperture. It would only be a matter of hours before they showed up again—no use chasing them down. Hours had passed since their escape. Neither one had resurfaced yet.

Caroline hovered at her desk, waiting for her assistant to spill his reason for startling her awake.

"The elevator," he said. "It's been called down. They should be back in less than fifteen minutes."

"Well, we'd better get down there," she said. No reason to hurry, though. Reaching the elevator itself would take but a few minutes—and she couldn't believe their stupidity. Did they honestly expect to return in their escape elevator. As if _that_ would slip by her.

"Want me to call some backup?" said Greg.

She shook her head. Intimidation alone should keep them from attempting to use force. And Greg—well, he wouldn't be _that_ helpful if it came to that. "Go ahead and shut down the surface elevator. Just in case," she said. She couldn't afford to let them slip by again.

He gave a small shrug and then joined her.

* * *

The elevator cables spun. The box beneath rose, higher and higher as if heavy hands were drawing it up. Currents of air rushed through the sides and Doug leaned against the wall.

Countless steps back to this elevator left his legs exhausted and heart weak. He was a scientist, not an Olympian—exercise wasn't a priority for him. And now his breaths sputtered like an idling car.

Eating something earlier would have been a good idea. A can of beans, or even a drink of water. He could've used the extra strength.

He was being watched.

He didn't know how, or even why. He was the only one down here besides Chell. But ever since those recordings went off, anxiety had clung to him like wet hair after a shower.

He couldn't shake the feeling of being watched. Caroline could be down there, lying in wait and watching him leave. She could've had this all planned out; she could've played him for a fool.

Doug flinched as loud and menacing laughter burst out from behind him. A sick and hot sensation flared up inside and chocking him into a panic. His heart pounded—he could barely breathe, and his heart jumped.

Heated discussions rose around him, garbled over the machinery sounds but gaining in volume and intensity as the elevator neared the end of its track. Doug clamped his hands over his ears, the pressure against his head growing until it reached an unbearable level.

His vision swam, and he didn't hear the soft ding of the elevator's arrival. Silence rushed over him as he dared to glance around, immediately focusing on three—no, wait, two— approaching figures.

Swift and overwhelming recognition swept through him. Greg and Caroline were _here,_ and they were heading straight for him. His breath caught and he blacked out, the loss of consciousness as sudden and swooping as a glitching computer flashing into black.

"Well," said Caroline as he slumped onto the ground. "That was impressive."

* * *

He should have rescued her sooner.

The thought perpetuated itself as he paced his relaxation vault. It'd been at least a day, if not two since he'd left Chell. But however long he'd spent here, Chell had been in this position far longer.

He should have rescued her sooner.

It was quiet here, and the silence terrified him.

But between those brief and frightening seconds of peace, voices swirled around him.

_She's going to find her._

_ You should've picked a better hiding spot._

_ Everything's worse because of you._

They emanated from both everywhere and nowhere, filling the room with conversation. He never heard Caroline's voice; he never heard his mind's voice.

_You're a failure._

_ All of this—it's your fault._

_ Why do you even try?_

The words cycled through him like an indecisive driver going around a traffic circle. With no radio, no outside sounds, and no people to distract him, Doug only had his mind and his regrets to keep him company.

He should have rescued her sooner.

No one was coming to rescue him; he was trapped. The walls of the relaxation vault reminded him that testing was but a chamberlock away. But just like Chell, Caroline hadn't given him the standard orange jumpsuit.

He slipped into the pod, seeking relief from his mind. The glass hissed shut and stasis-inducing gas flowed in to kickstart the suspension.

He should have rescued her sooner.

* * *

_Scriiieeeeeech._

The vault rattled as it docked into the testing track. Doug slipped out from his pod, shielding his eyes from the overhead lights.

"Welcome back, Doug," said Caroline. He winced at the influx of volume over the speakers and then grabbed the clipboard from his nightstand. Light boxes listed off potential testing hazards. Burns. Acid. Fall injuries. Bullets. Vaporization. He didn't bother flipping the page to see what else he might encounter.

He let the hard plastic clatter onto the nightstand, then reached beneath it. His fingers grasped at air as he searched for a familiar bottle.

"Don't bother looking for your medication. I've never tested a paranoid schizophrenic, and pills won't give me the results I need," she said. "And though you left me without a test subject, you're here now. And while we wait for her to show her face, a few tests are in order."

"You'll never find her," he said.

"Oh, I will. _Believe_ me, I will."

Doug shook his head—she wouldn't find her. She couldn't. He couldn't allow himself to think like that, not after all they'd gone through.

"Look, you've got to let go whatever vendetta you've got against Chell. I'll test in her place, if that's what you want. Just leave her alone. Let her go."

"You know why I hate her so much? It's not for no reason," she said, voice dipping. "Black Mesa's got some of our most valuable technology thanks to her. God knows how badly they'll screw it up—I honestly wouldn't be surprised if they caused an apocalypse."

"But that's not her fault," he said. "You can't blame her for what her parents did."

"Hold on," said Caroline, a hint of surprise in her voice. "She never told you, did she?" She gave a soft, amused laugh and her face brightened.

Doug pressed a hand against the wall.

"You were so desperate for friendship that you let the girl pull the wool right over your eyes," she said. "Letting her copy blueprints for the tunneling device? Her trap couldn't have been more obvious. Even I didn't think you were that stupid."

"Then how come you didn't see it either?" he shot back. It was practice. Just art practice, nothing else. He would've known about anything else.

"When it comes to my tunneling device staff, I trust them to not be so careless with that information. I suppose I was wrong about you," she said. "Oh well. It's nothing a little testing can't fix."

"You're making a mistake," said Doug. His phonebook of a contract had covered everything under the sun, but he couldn't recall the protocol for mandatory employee testing. The legality of this had to be shaky. "This isn't right."

"Oh, I'm _sorry_," she said, voice mocking. "I was under the impression that, besides being responsible for the loss of both the zero-point energy manipulator AND half of the portal device, you broke into my private property, completely ruined a relaxation vault, and attempted to help a test candidate escape from the facility—not to mention whatever you may have done in those lower levels," she said. "But according to you this is _my _mistake?"

Doug fell silent.

"I didn't think so," she said. "And as soon as I find her, the real testing will begin. For now, though, let's get you started."

Doug said nothing, instead taking a few steps towards the door.

"The portal will open in three….two….one."

* * *

The weighted storage cube came up light in his hands, surprising Doug. After toting around his own cube crammed with art supplies and books, he'd expected more of a challenge.

But considering how he'd yet to acquire a portal device, it was a welcome surprise. He plopped the cube onto the super-colliding button, then shot a glance at the observation room.

"This isn't even a real test," she said. "Don't complain. You are a scientist, after all. Not a test subject. I've just got to make sure you understand the basics of cube and button based testing before we continue."

The doors clicked open. Doug moved on.

* * *

_Bzzzz-ttt._

A backlit panel flickered, flashing numbers and symbols against a white background.

1/19

Nineteen test chambers—that was all that separated him from the end of the testing track, him from Chell. He didn't know how long that could take, but Caroline couldn't keep him here forever. She'd have to let him go sometime.

The blue portal switched with a hiss. Doug ducked into a room, grabbing a cube and then dashed back to the main room. The portal switched. He darted in to deposit the cube.

There. Test completed. If the remaining eighteen were as simple as this, he'd finish in a matter of hours.

And the faster he completed them, the faster he'd be able to go back for Chell.

* * *

2/19

The single portal device rotated on a spindly stand, firing every few seconds. With a hop through a portal, Doug slipped the device into his hands. If he ever managed to escape, to sneak in the spaces between chambers where elevators met facility and catwalks joined and panels meshed, the device would be useless.

It was built specifically for testing, not for traversing.

Better than no portal device at all—but not by much.

* * *

6/19

Caroline slipped between rooms with ease, often arriving at her positions before Doug himself. "I wanted to thank you, by the way," she said. "I don't often get to use this testing element. I am required to warn you that any contact with the High Energy Pellet will cause immediate vaporization. Please be careful."

The energy ball hissed as it bounced from floor to ceiling like a pinball. Eventually it fizzled out, but moments later another jumped out from the generator. He took a long moment before shooting his blue portal on the ceiling. The orange one on the floor opened and the receptacle flashed blue as the pellet entered.

The unstationary scaffolding sputtered to life. As Doug rode it he couldn't help but notice the growing difficulty and complexity of these tests. His estimate of a few hours may have been preemptive.

One wrong move, one misfire of the gun and he'd wind up as a pile of ash on the chamber floor.

* * *

10/19

"These next tests apply the principles of momentum," said Caroline. "Mind your step."

A vaguely unsettling feeling washed over Doug as he glanced at the gap between floor and stairs. The last few steps were missing. He could've climbed up—but with the portal device in his hands, there must be a simpler solution.

Still, something felt missing.

Two icons lit up the warning panel—one of a figure falling into a portal, and another of a figure flinging out of a higher portal. Doug twisted back—sure enough, a swirling orange portal waited above on a panel.

Caroline urged him on from a window to his left. Doug inhaled sharply as he fired a portal beneath his feet, falling then flying then fumbling forward on the staircase.

His legs groaned in protest from the unexpected jolt of landing. It would be nice if there was something out there to dampen drops like that—and if earlier chambers were any indication, the drops would undoubtedly grow larger.

"Long-fall boots," Doug said softly. Aperture had a device built specifically for dampening falls, and yet he wasn't wearing the boots.

"Missing something?" said Caroline. She couldn't help but latch onto his break from silence. Though he'd yet to give any outward indications of his schizophrenia, talking to himself was a good start.

He gave a solemn nod, the stoic expression on his face reminding her of Chell. The chamberlock whooshed closed behind him as he advanced into the next section of the three-part chamber. White tiles explained the same concept—a figure falling, and then flying. He clutched the gun to his chest as he approached a pit.

"That's too bad," she said. "You of all people know that the long-fall boots were built as a foot-based suit of armor for the tunneling device. They're meant to protect the device—NOT the test subject."

Doug edged towards the wall, noting how there weren't any stairs at the bottom of the drop. It wasn't _that_ far, but a fall could still hurt. He exhaled, then fired his portal.

His stomach dropped as he whooshed through the tears in space, and a moment later he landed on the far side of the chamber.

"I thought about it, and honestly couldn't think of a reason to give you the long-fall boots. Your job is to fix portal devices broken during testing, and if you happen to break it—well, you can fix it yourself," she said. "Be careful not to fall."

Doug's face furrowed as he moved into the final portion of the test. All of his tools, his blueprints, were back in his lab. If he broke the device here he wouldn't be able to fix it. He tightened his right hand on the handle as he approached the next drop.

He inhaled sharply, backpedaling. This was the longest fall he'd seen yet, and a staircase would up from the bottom in case he found himself stranded there. Helpful. Well, as helpful as stairs might be to a man with broken legs.

A closed portal glowed at the bottom, and Doug twisted to get a better look at the panels above his head.

Solving these tests was going to take a lot longer than he'd originally thought. Hours had passed since that first chamber, and he still had nine chambers to go. He had to be much more careful than he'd thought. He'd have to take his time.

A mistake could be fatal. He couldn't charge forward and rely on trial-and-error. A misplaced portal or a crooked fall from this high could mean broken body parts.

And if he missed, he had no boots to give him a second chance.

Doug triple checked his portals. The orange sat beneath his feet, and he locked the blue into place on an extended panel. Other ledges dotted the chamber, jutting out from higher and higher up. The scientist wished he could've worked out the test's overall solution before making any moves, but the high shelves blocked his view.

He'd have to solve it one jump at a time.

His stomach dropped as he leaped from the edge. The portal rushed closer and he struggled to align himself before his blue portal flung him across the room. He felt as if he'd been tossed about by an ocean wave, overwhelmed by water and unable to tell which direction was up.

_Skreeeeek._

His shoes skidded and Doug tumbled onto his knees. For a long moment he froze, first tense and then relaxing. He'd done it. He _hadn't _missed. The dots on the wall told him two drops remained, but he'd done it. And he could do it again.

He gingerly felt at knees, fingers brushing the developing bruises. His calves already stung from impact, and his ankles popped as he pushed himself to his feet.

A few more falls like that and he wasn't sure he'd be able to walk.

* * *

13/19

"Now that you've acquired the dual portal device, these next tests could take a very, _very_ long time," she said. "Not that I'm in a hurry. But you're going to miss the party if you don't pick up the pace. It's only a few days away, after all."

Of _course._

Caroline's birthday.

Aperture's only party.

He knew it was this month, but he hadn't realized how close the date was.

Employees brought in assorted foods and deserts, then gouged them down over the hour-long event. Inevitably, some poor soul wound up with the job of making _her_ a cake—a stressful undertaking, to say the least. Her guidelines for a birthday cake were so precise and particular—a black forest cake, topped with cherries and a single candle. No more, no less. And she expected perfection.

* * *

16/19

"This next test involves turrets," said Caroline. "I would warn you further about their damage capabilities, but I'm sure you're already familiar with them. You've got a disabled one in your office, after all. Good luck."

_Turrets._

Supposedly for defense, he'd never bothered to fully activate the one in his lab. That high and mechanized voice had been unsettling enough with the guns disabled—and the idea of a fully-armed one made his skin crawl.

"Hell-o?"

A red line streaked across the doorway, wavering then focusing on a panel to his right. The robot gave a few muffled dings as it searched for him. Doug backpedaled.

If he took another step, it'd fill him with bullets. So how was he supposed to get past a three-legged gun?

Oh. Right. He glanced down at his portal device, then darted out from the corner. He placed one portal beneath the construct and the other on a far wall and the turret disappeared.

"A-Aaa-Aaaah!"

A moment later, a soft "Why-y?"

He moved carefully through each turn, listening to turrets call out and then calm down before knocking them off balance. He took his time with each one. Hurrying could lead to mistakes, and he'd rather take his time than incapacitate himself. Besides, Chell was safe.

As long as she remained in that room, she'd stay that way.

* * *

Flip.

Skim.

Flip.

Chell sighed, letting her arms drop to the bed. Pages crumpled as the book flopped onto her stomach. It slid aside as she reached for another.

As she cracked it open, a disgusting and soggy smell poured out. While old book smell had never been her favorite, she much preferred the carefully-preserved smell of dusty golden pages to _this._

She spiraled down each sentence and paragraph and page, but moments later she couldn't remember a word of what she'd read. Her reading turned into an impossible set of stairs—no matter how far she descended, she made no progress.

She had hoped these books would be fiction—not dull and overly technical non-fiction. She'd hoped for a long and elaborate tale, something she could lose herself in for hours on end. But these—they were far too scientific.

Most were manuals for outdated and obscure Aperture equipment. Others were on nuclear fallout, and one was on the history of the company itself. This collection was meant to instruct and educate, after all—not to entertain the employees marooned in a salt mine.

A similar problem cropped up with the board games. This room was intended to accommodate a number of people—not just one. The only game that didn't require multiple players were a few decks of cards. And even then, she couldn't remember the rules to any solitary games.

It had been three days.

Three days of plastic-tinted water and metal-tinted beans. She'd almost gagged at the first can—and even now, she couldn't eat them without wincing. Three days of building up and tearing down houses of cards; three days of skimming through technical books. It had been three _days_ since Doug had left, and the boredom was beginning to get to her.

She set her book aside and shifted to her feet.

It couldn't hurt to look around, could it?

* * *

As Doug turned another corner, the communications popped on. He'd just moved out of range of one of her observation rooms, so he didn't bother looking up at Caroline.

"Good news," she said. "Looks like that 'friend' of yours finally decided to show her face. It _has_ been a few days, after all. I'm off to give her a warm welcome. I'll be sure to tell her you said hello."


	14. The Fall

A/N: Sorry for the delay with this chapter! To be fair, it's over twice as long as any of my other ones. I'm going to apologize in advance for a couple of things: one, anything related to cake. Bear with me. I promise it will be meaningful later on. And two, the ending of this chapter.

Anyways, this was a lot of work, and I would LOVE to hear everyone's reaction to it.

* * *

Chapter 14 - The Fall

_Creak. _

The metal door wheezed open and fresh air swirled into her lungs. A landscape of dusty tables and yellowed equipment stretched in front of her. This place was frozen in time; she found the undisturbed room calming.

No one was here, and no one had disturbed this place in a long time.

She was undoubtedly alone.

For three days, she'd been safe. No one knocked on the vault door—and from the look of this room, no one had checked this office either. It was as if she'd disappeared altogether, swallowed up by Old Aperture like Doug intended.

Still, it should be safe enough to explore this area.

Every few seconds, she still peered out to check on the elevator. As long as it wasn't moving, she'd be safe.

She couldn't help but notice the lack of messages as she swept through the room. Either the former employees had been lucky enough to get out of listening to their boss's constant voice, or they'd been disabled.

Chell passed by a cheery fake plant on her way through the exit.

Well, that was enough of this room.

A catwalk wrapped around the building's edge and extended out onto a flat wall. Two doors littered the white rock face. White numbers in the upper left corner dated the area '1971'. Across the walkway, a sunset-themed Aperture logo hung beneath the testing spheres.

A warning bell sounded.

Chell's heart jumped. An elevator was descending.

She flipped around to head back toward the Borealis, back toward the office and back through the hallway. But a flash of movement from beneath her caught her attention.

Though the glass, she saw the outline of a person in the control room.

From here, she couldn't tell _who_ it was. It could be Doug—but she couldn't take the chance that it was Caroline, especially with the elevator bringing _another_ person down.

She needed to get out of sight.

She'd picked the worst possible spot to be—pressed against a flat white cliff with nowhere to go. But she couldn't just run back. The person in the control room shifted, moving toward the catwalks.

If she ran back, they'd know exactly where she'd been hiding.

No. She couldn't reveal her safe haven.

* * *

In the elevator, Caroline descended.

Surviving down here for days would be impossible without food and water, and the scattered cans and jugs around Aperture were all but impossible to find to the untrained eye.

Aperture only had five areas with those accommodations. She began her search at the bottom of the mine, and Greg began his at the top. They worked their way through each decade level, and met in the middle—1970's.

It was almost laughable how easy she'd been to locate.

Unlike the other four, this door was locked.

She was inside. She _had_ to be. But Chell couldn't hide there forever. Inevitably she would emerge. But while they waited, she left her assistant in the control room and gave him express instructions to notify her as soon as Chell began to move around the office above him.

Three days, though.

She would've been impressed if she wasn't so disappointed. The girl could have lasted _so_ much longer—not that Caroline was complaining. The less time she had to waste waiting for her, the sooner she could turn her focus back to running Aperture.

A blur of movement caught her eye as she arrived. The girl hovered on a catwalk directly across from the elevator platform.

Their eyes met.

Chell froze, then leaped over the right railing, hands squeaking against the slick surface.

She flailed as she fell, crashing on the walkway beneath. The metal beneath her, screeching like a knife dragged against glass. The impact jolted through her body, and it took a wobbly moment before she recovered to her feet.

Caroline watched her rub her knees for a moment, then throw open one of the two doors against the wall. The CEO straightened, then made her way to the control room.

"You're not going after her?" said her assistant, standing in the flat and rocky space between building and salt mine.

"No need," she said. "The hallway she's running through leads to the first chamber of a vitrified testing track. You know why we had to close that track?"

"Why?"

"Too deadly," she said, regret tinting her voice. "Then again, those _were_ the tests that first got us in trouble with the government," she said, and the two of them moved toward the doorway Chell had disappeared into.

* * *

Chell ran.

She didn't know where she was going, but she couldn't turn back now. She wouldn't let them grab her again and drag her into a testing chamber.

The hallway morphed into a dimly-lit tunnel. Cables ran against the walls, dipping down occasionally and connecting to breaker switches. A door screeched at the entrance. Someone shouted her name.

That wasn't Doug's voice.

She ran faster, and the path split. Chell turned right and tumbled through another doorway, passing beneath a green stencil of a man running.

SLAM.

Chell's eyes widened. A triumphant tune played over the speakers.

"Hello again, and welcome back to Aperture Science!" said Cave Johnson. His voice was far more cheerful and far more energetic in this message than the ones she'd heard before. "You gentlemen always were our best test subjects, and we are trilled to have you back for another round of testing."

_Testing. _

Chell's stomach dropped. She hadn't meant to go through any door that wouldn't open once closed.

A testing track—she'd ran right into a testing track.

"But since these next tests won't be involving that repulsion gel that you're so familiar with, Caroline threw in a test here to get you back into the swing of things before we move on to the real tests. It's been a while since you've had the Quantum Tunneling Device in your more-than-capable hands."

Her eyes watered. She'd never been in a real test chamber before—only a vault. But somehowshe'd been lucky enough to only be stuck in a vault. She flipped around and pried at the sliding doors, nails scratching and slipping as she struggled for a grip.

Nothing happened.

Once a test subject entered, the only escape was through the exit.

Well, at least this test didn't seem complex.

A dotted line connected a vent to a pedestal button, and Chell leaned forward to press it. She heard the distinct sound of the mechanism engaging, and a cube dropped down and onto a raised block.

It was about the height of a dinner table, and the hard edge dug into her stomach as she leaned for the cube. Her fingers only brushed it, pushing the cube away slightly. Chell hoisted herself onto the platform with a swing of her legs, then pressed her palms against the cube's edge and pushed it onto the floor.

There. Now all she had to do was carry it and drop it onto the square button.

A chime alerted her of the test's completion, and Chell moved quickly toward the exit. There had to be spaces between these chambers—hallways and elevators and catwalks that could give her a shot at escape.

"Aha! You've still got it," said Cave voice. "When you—astronaut, war hero, or Olympian—first walked these halls, we were just beginning trials on that device you're holding. But now that we've moved past those, it's time to see just what the limits of this device are. Just how long does it take for a man falling through portals to hit terminal velocity? And how far could that momentum fling you across the chamber?

"You're here because science needs to know. And what better way to give in to the trill of danger than by furthering the cause of science? So, honored test subject: welcome to Aperture Science's most challenging and most dangerous testing course."

* * *

Caroline walked.

She took one hallway, and her assistant covered the other one. And while her pace was quickened, she didn't run ahead and start shouting the way that her assistant had. But eventually the paths forked and they converged once again

"She's in there," he said, wheezing between words. One hand sat on his chest, and another on his knee. "In the testing track."

Caroline exhaled.

_Perfect._

She moved on, turning the corner and passing by a familiar reminder.

If you see an orange jumpsuit,

HIT THE RED BUTTON!

She felt a bit calmer as she entered the control room. An array of switches lined a table, each corresponding to specific positions in each chamber. She could broadcast messages of introduction or messages of congratulations, or just messages in general.

"Out of all places, you chose a testing track," said Caroline, flipping on a microphone. "And one of our best ones. I've got to hand it to you—I was right. You really would have been an excellent test subject."

Her fingers danced across the keys, eventually finding that red button. She glanced up.

A sense of nostalgia struck her as she examined the flowchart. Water stains dotted the material, and the edges curled in.

IN CASE OF TEST SUBJECT SELF-EMANCIPATION ATTEMPT:

1. Activate pressure doors.

Activated?

YES NO —Check to be sure door console is plugged in.

2. Search the area for hiding subjects.

Is Area Clear?

YES NO— DO NOT ENGAGE. Call and Aperture Party Escort Associate. Call Aperture facilities management.

She absently traced her finger down the chart, arriving at the same conclusion she thought she'd be at. It had been awhile since she'd done anything testing related, and even longer since she'd had to activate a seal. Subjects these days just didn't escape the way they used to.

She pressed the button and pressure doors crashed down all around the testing shaft. The room gave a low and rumbling sound, like an airplane roaring by overhead.

No one was getting in, and no one was getting out.

That decade had been particularly troublesome for them all. Apparently the successful completion of one testing course—_designed_ to make them feel invincible and make them want to return for more testing—meant more escape attempts the second time around after things got harder and deadlier.

They complained; they challenged Cave; they tried to escape.

_Tried._

But watching their futile efforts had been her favorite part. To her the subjects were ants under a magnifying glass, and she was more than happy to sit back and observe. But with one shift of a hand, she could easily shift that glass and focus in a sunbeam—and that, she supposed, really had been her favorite part.

* * *

"You may as well lie down and get acclimated to the being dead position, because that's what you'll be soon enough," she said. "There's no way out of that room."

Chell said nothing. Call it an experiment, but she was curious.

Caroline twisted her volume knob, then pressed her ear close to the speaker. Faint static. She tapped on the side.

"Can you hear me?"

Silence.

Well, that confirmed her suspicions. Chell had yet to see a camera down here, and Caroline seemed keen on audio feedback. But if Chell said nothing, the lady would have no idea what was going on here.

"Well, the audio _is_ working, so speak up anytime. Anyways," she said. "Mind the gap."

She moved forward, taking the time to get acquainted with the chamber's design. It seemed straightforward enough. A square button sat to the side of an exit. The large, flat floor of the chamber extended out a ways and then sharply dropped off, leaving a gap that extended so far down that Chell had to squint to see the single portable panel at the bottom, floating above a murky liquid. A poster on the wall depicted a man being dissolved by a pool of acid.

Oh. So that's what was gathered at the bottom of the pit.

A dark gray wall made up the other side of the pit, extending up and morphing into a ledge about fifteen feet up. A cube sat up there, near the back.

She wasn't sure if this test was contained by a testing sphere. Besides the sheer size of the drop, she couldn't see any bubble-like ridges like the ones she'd seen in the first chamber.

A few angled panels jutted out of the wall near the chamberlock.

So. She'd have to fall to get enough momentum to fling herself across that moat of death and up onto the ledge.

Even with a portal device, it would be difficult.

She'd have to keep her internal balance while falling from a considerable distance, and _then_ she'd have to worry about landing on the ledge itself. And even _if_ she had the guts and the gun to attempt it, she still could die. She could miss the panel and splash into acid; she could midjudge her fling and slam against the far wall like a bug onto a windshield.

She backpedaled from the edge, exhaling as she continued analyzing the chamber.

The exit required a cube on the button to open, but the only cube here sat on the high ledge.

She couldn't get the cube.

And even IF—by some miracle—she acquired the cube and managed to set in on the button, the chamberlock wouldn't open. She'd felt the ground tremble as the doors slammed and she'd heard the gloating in Caroline's voice.

A sick sense of realization jabbed at her, almost knocking her breath away.

There was no way out of here.

She was trapped, and she was going to die down here, slowly but surely starving to death if she didn't go crazy first—

_No. _She broke off her thought, rubbing at the back of her hands to calm herself.

She couldn't let herself think like that. There had to be something she'd overlooked, some obvious solution that didn't require a portal gun or long-fall boots even though the chamber was specifically built to require those things.

There had to be another way out of here.

There always was.

* * *

Chamber Sixteen fell silent.

Caroline hadn't spoken in a long while, and Doug moved through the chamber faster in her absence. He took out a turret on a ledge. As he turned, a camera caught his attention.

Partially blocked by a thick pane of glass, a turret locked on and sprayed bullets in his direction, one clipping his left forearm.

Doug inhaled sharply, stumbling to the side and into a bulletproof corner. It felt as if someone had dragged a knife across his arm, the pain sharp and stinging. He'd never gotten in range of a turret before, much less been shot at by one before. He clamped his right arm over it and blinked twice.

Red covered his fingers as he applied more pressure to it. The injury wasn't serious; it only clipped him. Plus, testing sentries weren't deadly. A one-hit kill wasn't good for testing.

But why did it have to _hurt_ so much?

He wilted, leaning back against the panels. His arm still burned and blood trickled down his arm, constant and yet not threatening.

He needed to get out of here—but there wasn't anyone around. No one would just show up and help him like he'd helped Chell. Especially not that personality sphere.

Unless…

Doug grimaced, partially in pain and partially in thought. Perhaps if he wrote out a message, the video feed might catch the attention of the robot. He dragged himself forward and into direct line of sight of a camera.

He pulled away his hand from the wound, using the blood tipping his finger to scrawl a single shaky word.

HELP

He wished for silence—for a true and interrupted calmness, like strolling through falling snow, blurs of white muffling the world.

He closed his eyes for a moment, and instead got a blizzard of sounds. Jokes and insults and snide comments rushed in, only amplifying his pain rather than distracting from it.

He barely noticed the crack like a broken branch as something jerked out of position. A panel to his side groaned, scraping outwards. Doug jerked out of his exhausted haze, scrambling out the way.

He hadn't pushed any buttons.

This wasn't part of the test.

A red glow emanated from the open area. He stuck in his good arm, expecting his palm to press against cold grating but instead only feeling empty air.

Without hesitation, he ducked underneath panel, hair brushing the metal pole holding it open. He felt the flooring change from smooth panels to rough tiles as he crawled forward and into the dim area.

He stood, turning a half-circle as he examined the space. Completely enclosed. A chain-link fence stretched across the right wall of the room, guarding the keypad-enabled exit. A slice of light, bright and angular, filtered in from the ajar door.

_Knock. _

_ Knock knock._

He dismissed the faint sound, turning back to the entrance until it grew more insistent.

_Knock knock knock._

"Hello? Anyone in there? Can't really tell, since you've gone and disappeared from the camera's view. Not sure if you caught my hint there, with the secret panel," he said. "Not sure how I did that. Usually I need the receptacle. Anyways, though. If you're out there, please come in. I _am _the one holding it open, and I can't do it forever," said Wheatley, faint but still audible. "Ah. No response. Must be too busy testing to notice. Okay, then. I'll give you another five minutes, then I'll stop holding this door and then come into the room."

He glanced at the fence again, sizing up the gap between ceiling and metal. If he couldn't make it and Wheatley closed the panel, he'd be trapped in here. From down here, he wasn't sure if he'd be able to squeeze through.

He ducked out of the room, placing a portal behind the camera and watching it sizzle onto the ground. On a screen somewhere, the live feed hissed and faded into a blizzard of black and white.

A few weighted storage cubes sat in the corner, ready to be used to be dropped on the turrets behind the glass. These cubes were strong and sturdy, and it would take a considerable amount of force for the panel to crush them. The panel itself would break before those cubes would.

The energy manipulator hissed to life. Doug tilted the device, angling in the cubes to sit between panel and wall.

Perfect. Now he had a safety net in case he failed at scaling the fence.

He ducked back in and headed for the rear wall, rapping his knuckles against the rear wall.

"Aha! Knocking. So there IS someone in there. Well. Time to drop the panel controls, then," he said. A screeching and groaning sound came from panel.

_Pop._

A burst of sparks. The panel went slack.

Doug turned back to the partially-open door, listening to the robot groan as if physically pushing something. More sparks. The door creaked open. Oh. Well, maybe he _had_ physically pushed his way in.

"Not much of a room you've got there now, is it?" said Wheatley. The robot didn't advance further; he was stuck at the end of his management rail. His optic rose into a smile. "All I could do on such short notice, really. With a word as urgent and vague as 'help' I had to hurry. Just what, exactly, did you need help with?"

Doug raised a finger to his lips, and then glanced fearfully at the open panel. The robot nodded—Doug had his attention, at least for now. Doug needed to explain his situation, but his voice—and Wheatley's voice—would draw too much attention. If they spoke, it'd only be a matter of time before Caroline reexamined the blind spots in the chamber.

He fished around his coat pocket and yanked out a thick black pen. The cap came off with a small pop, and he clicked it onto the opposite end.

He sketched a turret in the bottom left of a panel, pressing his slick thumb in the robot's optic to provide the splash of red.

_Hello?_

_Can I help you?_

_ Testing,_ he mouthed to the robot. _I was testing._ To make his point clear, he circled his pen on the panel in the vague shape of a portal, and drew a weighted storage cube falling.

"Ah," said Wheatley. "Forgive me. I just assumed that the situation you were in was far more, well, life threatening than a few nicks from those little guys. Not exactly deadly, are they?"

Doug glared at the robot, once again raising a finger to his lips. His mind searched for a way to explain this, to make it absolutely clear as to why the artificial intelligence needed to _shut up _and realize how important it was for him to escape.

He scrawled he image of a security camera, then glanced back to make sure he still had the robot's attention before adding the words beneath.

She's WATCHING you.

His optic pinpricked, and his voice dropped in volume. "W-why would she be watching _me_? I've done nothing wrong. Must be something you did. "

Doug sighed—he was missing the point entirely. He glanced around the deserted room, noticing a couple of fallen posters that had drifted into a corner, no doubt leftover from an earlier time.

He grabbed one of the posters and slapped it over the camera drawing. The edges curled in, and it depicted two stick figure friends standing in the center of a blue Aperture logo.

**A Trusted Friend in Science.**

Doug pointed at the black figure on the left, and then at his chest. The robot nodded, connecting the two of them. Doug was the man on the left.

The scientist then pointed to the other stick figure, the one wrapping its arm around the first one. He jabbed at it, then pressed his fingernail into the paper's caption to underscore the FRIEND. The second figure was his friend.

And surely the robot knew that by friend, he meant Chell.

The robot's handles moved in and his optic widened. He nodded.

Doug moved on.

He wasn't sure _how_ to explain the next part of the story—how Chell was in Old Aperture; how Caroline had separated them—but he'd give his best shot.

In the past day he'd brushed with death more times than he could count. To him, every testing element—panels to acid to turrets—was practically synonymous with deadliness, if not death itself.

He scribbled a high-energy pellet in red, streaking lines to the right to make it look as if it was aimed directly at the poster's stick figures—the ones representing himself and Chell.

This testing element—which killed on contact—was the only way he could represent both Caroline and her frightening actions against the two of them.

Yes, it was a stretch, and one glance at the robot showed he was baffled. But Doug didn't know how to make it clearer. He glanced at the remaining poster in the corner and then gave a subtle smile.

That would work.

He slapped up the second one up and to the right of the pellet, positioning it so that the energy-ball-slash-Caroline seemed to originate from it.

A cake sat on a pink background, with one slice removed and poised on a robin's-egg-blue plate. White letters stretched across a red banner.

TASTY

One look at that poster, and the connection to Caroline couldn't be clearer.

Black ink leaked out of his cracked pen and smeared onto his hands. One of his many falls in testing must've broken it.

Despite being absolutely sure that the robot wouldn't get this, he might as well visually represent how Caroline had separated the two.

He pressed his stained hand onto the wall to the left of the cake poster, and began to etch out tally marks. In a few minutes, he hit ninety and then stopped.

In the bottom right, he repeated the process. Another ninety marks.

In total, one hundred and eighty tally marks.

Chell's current position was around four thousand meters beneath the surface, and three thousand beneath Doug. Three thousand meters equaled about one point eight miles. And if each mark represented a hundredth of a mile, then his one hundred and eighty tally marks—split in half visually by the streaking lines of Caroline's high energy pellet—represented that one point eight mile separation between himself and Chell.

Wheatley wouldn't get it; that was a given. But perhaps the sheer number of marks would be enough to clue him in on just how _far_ apart they were and how important it was for him to go back for her.

With his finger, he drew four red arrows. Two pointed down from the top group of tally marks—from _his_ group— and two pointed upwards from Chell's ninety tally marks.

Wheatley only gave him a sideways look as he struggled to decode the pictures, optic darting from side to side.

Ah, well. Doug could always explain it later. For now, he needed to get out of here.

He linked his fingers into the chain-link fence and leaned. The structure bent like paper in a breeze, as if it'd give way altogether. Not that breaking it would be a bad thing—in fact, it'd make it easier on him.

He stuck in his toes and reached up cautiously, wincing at the pressure on his left arm. Though the bleeding had stopped, the pain remained. But he couldn't afford to wait until the pain dulled entirely—the door was open, and he needed to _go._

He favored one arm over the other as he inched his way up. His balance wavered. His arms quivered. The cool wire dug into his fingers and toes.

His clothes snagged on the twists of wire at the top. Doug twisted sideways and awkwardly straddled the fence for a moment as he reached for footholds on the other side. Metal bit into his stomach. The tips of his shoes slipped, whiffing at empty air.

Doug released his grip and winced as he crashed into the ground.

Well, hopefully that'd be the last time he had to jump from a distance like that. He rubbed at his knees for a moment, then turned to the core.

The artificial intelligence's optic darted as his fidgeted. He kept widening and narrowing his look, wanting to speak but catching himself. Doug gave him a tired yet grateful smile, then slipped out the door.

A burst of fresh air rushed in, as cold and refreshing as if he'd thrown off a stuffy blanket and let air whoosh back in. The air here smelled different than the sharp smell of the testing tracks, as if someone in the other room was squeezing citrus. He gave a shaky sigh of relief.

Doug allowed himself the smallest of victories as he followed the robot through a dim hallway.

He'd done it.

He was _out_ of the testing track.

Not once, but twice now he'd gotten out of a room in her wing.

* * *

They walked in silence for a few moments, until Doug heard hushed voices and footsteps behind him. He waved his arm and they ducked into a side room, just as dim as the room behind the test chamber had been.

"Dark back here, innit?" said Wheatley, voice low yet unwelcome. "Y'know, I _do_ have a flashlight feature. Lights are always on here, and I've never had a use for it. But now—" he said.

"Wait," Doug hissed. "Leave it."

"I don't see why not—any bit of light could help back here, honestly," he said, adjusting himself as if revving up to do something important.

"We're _hiding," _ he said.

"I—I know. Just. Would be nice to not be in the dark," he said, and Doug heard a sound like someone clicking on a lighter.

"Wheatley. You can't turn on that light," he said, words tinged with panic. He scrambled to come up with a convincing enough reason to keep him quiet and inconspicuous. "Listen—you're afraid of dying, right? Well, if you turn on that flashlight, you will _die." _

His optic shrank to a spec, and he trembled in his casing. "Well why didn't you just _tell_ me? I had no idea, really. T-thank you. I was just about to turn it on, too. Hah. That would've been disastrous," he said, and Doug gave a grim nod of agreement.

* * *

When the threat cleared, they moved on.

On their way to his office, they passed a few crowds of people. For once, Doug was glad to be wearing his work clothes. They were dirty and a bit smelly after a few days, but were still better than wearing one of those awful orange jumpsuits.

At least these were comfortable, and far less conspicuous.  
But clothing wasn't his main objective. He needed to get to his office, and then get to Chell.

* * *

Water streamed from the faucet, bubbling and gurgling. Doug rolled up his sleeves and stuck his forearm underneath the tap. He rubbed at the caked-on blood, wringing his hands.

The water ran pink as it swirled down the drain.

Even in the safety of his office, he couldn't shake the feeling that someone had gone through and searched his office. His papers and files and pens seemed in a higher state of disarray than he remembered.

Doug hit the handle with his elbow. The faucet squeaked off. Drops splattered as he shook his hands, then wiped them on his pants. He paced around his office and sifted through piles of papers, flicking through them with an increasing intensity. He barely heard the click of his lock as it disengaged.

"Doug?"

He didn't glance up. Any voice other than his own was suspect; he didn't make the connection between that voice and Henry.

"Looking for something?"

"Oh! Henry." Doug briefly looked up, startled, and went back to skimming. "Trying to find a way to get down to Old Aperture, and I _can't_ use that elevator."

"Well, none of us can either. It's out of service," said Henry.

"No, it's not," he said. "I was just down there, and I need to get back down there."

"Doug, it doesn't work."

The scientist gave him a serious look, and then discarded his search. "It works, and it looks like that's my only option." He moved toward the door, leaving behind a confused Henry. A stack of papers slid, rectangles of white drifting onto the floor.

"Wait!" he said, moving to catch up with him. "You're wasting your time. It's out of service."

The pathway to the elevator was unusually deserted. He'd expected a few wary looks, or a few questioning gazes like the ones he'd experienced on his way to his office. He still shot a look over his shoulder as he approached the elevator itself.

He pressed the circular button with two fingers.

It didn't light up.

"I told you. It's busted," said Henry.

Doug pressed it again, leaning in and expecting sounds of machinery whirring to life. Instead, he spotted a stained poster plastered to the doors. He frowned.

NOTICE

Please excuse the inconvenience.

This elevator is out of service until:

He knew for a fact that this elevator worked—this didn't make sense. Even if it was broken, that date should be filled in.

Unless, of course, there were no plans to repair it.

"Wait," said Doug. "I know there's plans to make Pneumatic Diversity Vents compatible with elevators. You think they'd connect one down there?"

"It's just a concept right now," he said, then frowned. "And why do you _need_ to get down there so badly? You haven't said."

"It's her" he said, stretching out a hand to rest on the closed doors. "She's down there."

"Who?" Henry crossed his arms, leaning back on his feet.

"Chell. I know, I know—" he said, raising a hand in a 'stop' motion in hopes he'd get a moment to explain. "She's still here. In Aperture."

"Why?"

Doug's chest caved in. "I was right about her parents," he said. "But I had to get her out of there. Old Aperture was the only choice. And now she's waiting for me to come back and it's been days and this elevator's got to work—"

"Hold on," said Henry. "Slow down. What happened?"

"Caroline. She told me she'd found Chell. She's going to find her down there and I can't let that happen again. She's going to test her the way she tested me, I know it. I just don't know what to _do,_" said Doug, voice wavering.

"Take a second and just breathe," said Henry. "You're sure about this?"

"She had her in a relaxation vault, Henry," he said. "She was going to test her, I knew it. I had to get her out of there."

"You're not making sense. We haven't had mandatory employee testing in _years,_ much less testing on young girls. Caroline's relaxed on that ever since the old man kicked the bucket."

Doug's gaze shifted between Henry's left eye and right eye, unable to focus on just one. Henry shifted, unnerved by the constant eye contact.

"Then explain to me how I just escaped from a testing track after being trapped in there for days."

"Don't be ridiculous," said Henry. " You're not wearing a jumpsuit and you don't have any sort of fall device protecting your legs. You're still in your work clothes."

"That's the point!" he said. "She doesn't want you to believe me, but I've got bruises and cuts and a bullet wound that proves it. I just can't sit back and let the same things happen to Chell."

"Doug. Stop," he said. "Listen to yourself. No one's ever broken out of a testing track, and it looks to me like you haven't slept in a few days—"

"I haven't."

"—and have you refilled your prescription lately?"

A pause.

Doug broke his gaze, realization sinking in.

"You think I made it all up, don't you?"

"If you just listened to yourself, you would too." Henry sighed. "Conspiracies. Lashing out. Believing that someone is out to get you. You know what I'm describing. And what you're saying—well, it's an almost to-the-letter definition of paranoid schizophrenia," he said. "You can't deny it."

"But it happened," said Doug, voice low. "All of it happened. I know it did."

"What you're describing—it's not a new thing. At least once a week this past month you've come running into my office, completely convinced that something impossible happened," said Henry. "Come on. What else could it be?"

A sinking feeling pulled at Doug's stomach. What he said was true. He couldn't explain why, but it was almost as if—at random—his medicine simply stopped working. He'd be flung, full-force, back into ceaseless paranoia and delusions. And the next day he'd take another pill and feel perfectly fine. But he didn't know _why._

"It's just another episode," said Henry, with his best attempt at reassurance. "You're always going to see things that aren't there, and you're always going to feel like someone's out to get you. You're a paranoid schizophrenic, Doug. Medicine can't fix everything."

Henry gave a heavy sigh, shoulders sagging. Eyes downcast, he didn't even see Doug slump against the wall and just stare at his hands, rubbing and twisting them as if nothing else in the world mattered.

The scientist couldn't help but wonder how much of what Henry had said was true. Those days without medicine—they'd been disorienting, sure. And he'd experienced several minor hallucinations. But as far as what had happened—he was absolutely certain it was real.

The other scientist exhaled. "Just—take another pill. Compose yourself," he said, avoiding Doug. "I'm heading back." He turned, moving down the hallway.

.Doug lifted his head, dropping his hands to his side and pushing himself to his feet.

"Wait. Hold on," he called down the hall. He pulled out a pen and a scrap of paper, pressing it up onto the wall and scrawling a message. He underlined his last word twice, then crumpled the paper into the man's hand.

Henry flipped it over, frowning.

username: cjohnson

password: tier 3

TRUST ME

"What's this for?" he said, folding it in half and absently creasing it.

"It's about the GLaDOS project," he said. "And proof that I'm not lying."

Henry forced a smile, tucking the paper into his pocket. He gave it a pat before walking away and leaving Doug hovering by the broken elevator.

* * *

Minutes passed.

Doug stared at the elevator, his good hand pressed against cool metal.

This couldn't be right.

Whatever was going on here, he _knew_ that he'd taken this elevator before.

Hadn't he?

He reached over again, pressing the pad of his thumb onto the cracked button. It depressed, then gave a dim glow. The doors slid open and light trickled in.

The elevator shaft was empty.

Doug frowned. Well, at least he was getting closer. He pressed again.

_Click._

WHOOOOOSH.

Doug yanked back his head. Cables snapped with a sharp hiss. Lines sparked. Metal screeched and the elevator streaked by, throwing air currents into his face before disappearing into the depths below.

Oh no.

Oh no oh no oh no oh no.

He swallowed, palms slick as his hands tightening around the edge of the doorframe.

His tie dangled into empty space as he leaned out. More sparks lit up the elevator shaft, and the elevator gave an earsplitting screech as it slowed to a stop.

The smell of electric burn and hot rubber floated up, and Doug's stomach sunk as low as the elevator shaft. His arms trembled.

The elevator was gone.

Broken. Smashed. Beyond repair, probably.

And all thanks to him.

He stood in a dazed fog, transfixed and frozen at the horrifying sight of the empty elevator shaft. He barely felt Caroline's hand clamp onto his upper arm, firmly guiding him back to the test chamber he'd just left.

"Nice job breaking it, hero."

* * *

"I wanted to thank you," said Caroline. "I've been meaning to sever those last connections to the lower levels."

His mind cleared, and regret settled in like rocky sand in the bottom of a shoe. "So there really is no other way down there," he said softly.

And here he was—back in Chamber 16. He couldn't believe how _stupid _ he'd been—how he hadn't fought back or done anything but sit there in shock and just let her drag him back like some misbehaving puppy.

"No," she said, voice sharp. It had all been rigged, of course. She'd set the elevator to disengage after repeated button mashing, but it'd be no fun if she told him that. "This is _my _company now, and I can't run this place if the voice of a dead man is still calling all the shots. So you've done me a favor," she said.

Doug passed by deactivated turrets, flinching as their optics flashed red and high, innocent questions floated up like notes. He blinked. The optics went dark; the voices disappeared. Another delusion.

"But I can't forgive that little stunt you pulled in the testing track," she said. "It's not like you accomplished anything with it. Really, did you think anyone would believe such an outrageous story from a confirmed schizophrenic?"

Doug edged his way through the already-completed first half of the chamber, heart jumping when he noticed the panel still extended.

He crawled through, bumping his head on an edge.

Most of the den remained unchanged. His drawings still covered a panel; broken and abandoned building materials still cluttered the floor. But the door—behind the fence he'd climbed—was missing a handle, as if it had retracted into the door itself. Dark squares stained the metal where the keypad had once been.

She knew. She must've figured it out.

Not that it came as a surprise.

No one ever escaped from Aperture. At least, not without a little help.

A gleam of white caught his eye—the portal device was still there, right where he'd left it. In hindsight it had been stupid to leave it behind, and back here of all places.

"There really is no chance of seeing her again, now that you've put that elevator out of commission. Hiding back there is pointless and counterproductive," she said. "Come back, and complete this test."

Doug pulled the portal gun close, then crossed his legs and sat. He propped his head on his hands and just stared at the wall, mind tracing back the moments. Regret hung next to him, thick and dark and almost tangible. His mind flashed, loud to soft to incomprehensible, scrambling what he thought was true into an impossible word search.

Maybe he could fix the lift.

The break itself didn't seem complex. Severed wires. An electrical overload. The box itself seemed intact, screeching to a stop rather than smashing into pieces at the bottom.

Maybe he could find a pair of long-fall boots.

Jump down there, find Chell, and then fix it. It might take a while—and he knew _nothing_ about elevator mechanics—but he could learn. Teach himself after he got out of here.

Oh, who was he kidding?

He sighed again, folding his arms and pressing his forehead against them.

"Look. My birthday's only getting closer," said Caroline, speakers raising in volume. "If you don't hurry up and get out of there you're going to miss out on some delicious cake."

A surge of fury shot through Doug, and his face quivered at the unexpected anger. Aggression—yet another sign of schizophrenia, he noted with disgust.

The reds and pinks of the cake poster filled his vision and Doug jammed the tip of his pen into the panel. A phrase shouted itself over and over, so loud and insistent that he could barely think.

the cake is a lie

the cake is a lie

the cake is a _lie_

the cake is a lie

the cake is a lie___

His fingers trembled on the last repetition of the phrase, losing all strength. The pen clattered to the ground. Doug pressed his palm into his forehead, teeth clenched.

It didn't make sense.

Just like the elevator not working, it didn't make sense.

He'd been to those birthday celebrations before. He'd eaten his fair share of dessert and enjoyed the break from work just as much as every other employee did. It wasn't often that they got paid to waste their time like that, after all.

There shouldn't be anything bad about it—and yet Doug couldn't shake the feeling that something horrible was going to happen, that something horrible was already happening.

He pressed his blackened hand once more on the wall, then grabbed the portal device. Caroline would have to rely on direct-line-of sight for the remainder of the chamber—she wouldn't see his exit from the room.

Well. She'd figured it out soon enough.

Doug attacked the remainder of the test with a cold, detached intensity. He'd made it through fifteen of these before—what was three more? Red beams streaked. Bullets grazed by him, and turrets cried out.

He jammed a stray wrench—stolen from the den's debris— into one vital testing apparatus. The vent hissed and retracted, letting a cascade of weighted storage cubes tumble into the alcove.

He grabbed two cubes and returned them, wedging them once again between panel and wall. Better to leave an opening into that room than assume he'd never need it again.

The panel would remain broken, though. Caroline would rather leave it that way than attempt to fix it from her computer. Sending a repair command to an individual panel, and searching for that panel's individual serial code in a sea of numbers and letters was far too time consuming.

Besides, she'd removed the other exit from the den. Sealing it off wasn't a priority.

Pop pop.

Pop.

Pop.

Three turrets fell in succession, clearing the next room.

"If this burst of energy is some sad and misguided attempt to try and get to her, don't even try. I've already hooked up communications between her and me. So. Take your time, and listen to us as you go through these next chambers."

The gravity feature hissed as he picked up a fallen cube, dropping it onto the button. The chamberlock twisted. A red laser darted from behind grating; Doug ducked to the right.

"I really did try to get her to come back up here. She wouldn't listen," she said. "Ran right into an old, vitrified testing track. It's sealed off for a reason—you have to understand that I can't let anything get out of there. She left me no choice but to activate the emergency seal."

The portals relinked; Doug continued through the two box-like rooms. He gritted his teeth, attempting to shut down his swirling mind. He had enough difficulty focusing already. He couldn't show any emotion, any reaction.

"No gun, no boots, no exit. She's not getting out of that room anytime soon—at this point, it's a matter of time until she dies. Still, I thought you'd appreciate hearing her final transmission."

So she was alive. She was down there and she was breathing and Doug had no doubt she'd fight just as hard as he did to find a way to escape. The slight sense of relief wasn't enough, though.

He deactivated two more turrets.

Test completed. The elevator slipped open.

Doug slid inside and stuck out a hand, sinking into the soft paneling. Overhead, the speakers crackled on. With audio quality low and static high, a sickening feeling told him that Caroline really _had_ managed to hook up a microphone to whatever hellish testing chamber she'd trapped Chell in.

He could not hear Chell's voice, but he could still hear _her._ Her footsteps. Little scrapes of movement. Vague hints as to the situation three thousand meters beneath his feet.

The elevator kicked to life, and Doug swayed. Caroline's voice came on again, but this time it wasn't directed at him—just Chell.

"Since I'm not down there with you, I can only imagine your expression when you hear what I'm about to say. When you copied down those files, did you even _know_ what you were doing?"

A pause.

"Yes," she said softly.

An overwhelming sense of disappointment cut through Doug.

So she'd been right.

Every time Caroline had accused Chell of it, he'd denied it. Every time Caroline pointed out obvious motivations and obvious evidence, he'd denied it.

His stomach lurched. She'd been right all along. Chell really had played him for a fool.

But how _far_ had it gone? How much of their fragile friendship was real, and how much had he simply imagined? The more he thought about it, the more it collapsed upon itself.

Doug slid to a sitting position, pressing both palms against his forehead.

"That's just whatI needed to hear," said Caroline. "You knew fully well what you got yourself into—this shouldn't be a surprise to you."

"Please," he heard Chell's static-muffled voice come on. "It was just an Aperture—I—I didn't know how _important _it was, I swear. I'm sorry," she said, a rare hint of desperation clinging to her words. "_Please_. I'm sorry. Just let me go."

"You've brought this upon yourself," said Caroline without hesitation. "And now you're trapped there."

Doug only heard a faint sniffle.

He pushed himself to his feet, standing on his toes to get closer to the speakers. He struggled to hear Chell's voice, but heard nothing. Just a thinking, ringing sound as if something was bouncing off a metallic surface.

At first he dismissed it as himself. But moments dragged on, and Caroline noticed the sound as well.

"Are you doing what I think you're doing?"

More scratching sounds from beneath, frequency increasing.

"You stop that."

Bang.

"You can't break down that exit with your bare hands, you know. It's metal."

Clang.

"If you're trying to beat yourself, I won't interfere. But if death is what you want—and it's inevitable, really—there's a much more painless method in that chamber. In fact, all of the other people who failed that chamber died by it. I'm sure it won't take you long to figure out."

Step step.

"The acid really is the way to go."

_Bang._

Silence.

Another flurry of footsteps sounded, heavy and constant like Chell was sprinting across the chamber.

"Hold on, what are you—"

Doug strained up a bit farther, legs aching and breath frozen.

Step step step STEP.

BANG.

A loud, echoing CRACK.

.

.

.

.

.

_ Splash._


	15. Your Faithful Companion

A/N: This was the hardest chapter to write emotionally for this fic so far. I came close to shedding a few tears, actually. I hope at least some of that emotion made it into this chapter.

Anyways, the writing on the walls comes directly from the game, just like in Chapter 14. Thank you, and enjoy the chapter!

* * *

Chapter 15 - Your Faithful Companion

_ Splash._

_ ._

_ . _

_ ._

_ ._

_ ._

Silence.

Doug held his breath, straining forward to hear through the static. All he needed was a sound—a scrape of a heel against the ground, a sigh of relief as Chell moved away. He needed a sign, a sound, something to assure him that she was alright.

Silence.

Doug said nothing.

Caroline said nothing.

And out of all the sounds his mind could've conjured into being, that splash—and this deep and complete silence following it—hurt more than any real sounds ever could. He would take Caroline's words any day over _that._

Doug stumbled out of the elevator and down the dark hallway. He swallowed.

Chell wasn't dead.

She couldn't be.

It was just a splash. Just a noise. He wasn't even sure if it had been real—Caroline hadn't even acknowledged it yet.

This was just a fluke. An accident. Sooner or later he'd hear soft footsteps or a quiet sigh and he'd know she was safe. Any second now, Chell would make a noise. She was usually quiet.

Surely this was just an extension of that.

* * *

In her room, Caroline raised her eyes to the window.

She'd heard that sound countless times before, and it could only mean one thing: the girl was most likely dead. Everything couldn't have gone more perfectly, really. She'd trapped Chell and she'd trapped Doug, and now her problems were more or less taken care of.

So that was it.

She'd won.

Caroline wanted to celebrate. She wanted to take her victory and rub it right into his eyes, but she couldn't find the words.

Instead, she felt empty.

She was only left with the most hollow sort of satisfaction, rising up for a fleeting moment before disappearing and leaving her devoid of emotion. A vaguely unsettling feeling clung to her, as if she should be feeling some sort of emotion other than this nothingness.

And yet, only anger crept up inside of her.

How _dare_ Chell give up like that.

She'd been clever. She'd been resourceful. She'd been the first real challenge that Caroline had faced in a long while. And while the whole thing had been infuriating and stressful, it had also been exciting.

She'd fought so hard the entire way. And yet she'd thrown it all away when she threw herself into the acid. She'd just given up.

That wasn't the Chell she'd known. Even thinking of the possibility that she'd actually done it and died made her stomach churn with unease.

So what had changed? What had driven her to that point?

Caroline blinked, moving out of her chair.

Had she pushed things too far?

Chell had been a threat to this company, and she'd already done enough damage as it was. She _had _to be stopped. But looking back on all of the horrible things Caroline had done, she couldn't help but wonder.

She moved back toward a microphone.

_Of course not._

"I'll be right back," said Caroline. "But first, a bit of explanation. This next chamber requires you to be accompanied by a companion. Please take better care of it than your last one," she said. "The Vital Apparatus Vent will deliver a Weighted Companion Cube in three, two one."

The vent hissed to life and a cube thumped to the ground. The bright warning panel buzzed to life.

17/19

He engaged the gravity feature and squinted. Instead of circles, six pink hearts adorned the sides of this cube. It looked so much like _his_ cube, the little prototype he carted around to store his painting supplies.

But no paint splatters marked the sides, and the size of the cube itself was far too large—the size of a normal weighted storage cube. But he didn't know _why_ an oversized duplicate of his own cube was staring him in the face. If Caroline thought she'd be able to hurt him with this, she was wrong. He had no connections, no shared memories with this companion.

The cube was like a couple of his favorite shirts—though they were faded and threadbare, he still couldn't bear to get rid of them. He'd never intended to become so attached to it.

But this wasn't his cube, and that was good.

Doug pressed the cube up against the gray ledge, using it to clamor up to the next level. He formed a patchwork staircase, climbing and then retrieving the cube until he'd made it to the top.

Sweat clung to his skin as he turned the next corner. More voice swirled around his mind,and no matter how hard Doug tried to pour his full attention into solving this test, they only grew more insistent.

While the test acted as a distraction, he couldn't keep the schizophrenia at bay indefinitely. If he had that much control over it, then he'd have no use for his prescription.

_BzzzzZZZzzt._

Doug darted as a high-energy pellet warbled by. He charged forward, shifting the portal device so that his cube acted as a fearless gray shield.

A pellet ricocheted, scoring the walls with black marks before dissipating. Doug turned the corner, hovering between pellet generators to size up the next hallway.

Those stairs, combined with the generator _behind him_ made advancing twice as difficult. He'd either have to walk in reverse and hope one wouldn't hit him, or deflect the current pellet and hope he didn't get hit in the back of a skull by the next energy ball.

He chose the latter. The pellet bounced off of his cube, ricocheting into oblivion.

An l-shaped staircase wrapped around to a ledge, which dropped off into the chamber's main area.

He threw a portal onto the level below and painlessly hopped through. Above him hung another blurred observation window, still devoid of Caroline's figure.

Well, at least she wasn't back yet.

He turned, and then jerked. He'd missed something upon his first sweep. Just like in the previous test chamber, a white panel partially jutted out from the wall. Doug stuck his free hand in the space between them, hand curling around the edge. He pulled, hard, shoulder straining and portal gun slipping in his right hand.

He sidestepped, then crouched to get a better glance in the room. Portal-friendly panels coated the interior, and he raised his gun. The portal spun as he fired, twisting and then popping open. Doug ducked inside.

Wheatley had gotten lucky his first time around—this room was far smaller, and with no exit in sight. Just empty panel after empty panel, no different than the remainder of the test. Old calendars and old posters littered the edges of the room like fallen leaves. These papers slipped in between cracks and lingered, untouched by this wing's nonexistent cleaning staff. With few people allowed access to this wing to begin with, maintenance tended to slip aside in back areas like this.

He glanced away, staring up at the unmarked panels.

Part of him insisted that Chell was dead. So many of his delusions he'd experienced in these past few days had been anything but fabricated, and even though Henry tried to convince him otherwise, he knew what had happened was real.

So how could that splash be any different? He knew he hadn't imaged it, but that sound could only mean one thing.

And yet Doug still clung to hope, a soft whisper in his heart telling him that Chell was still out there, wandering the facility and in desperate need of help.

He pulled his pen from his pocket and covered the wall in a zigzag trail of words as he mentally descended through the levels of Aperture in search of her.

Where

Are

You?

I

Will

Find

You.

He would get out of here. He would find her.

He had to.

Doug wouldn't give up until Chell was safe, however long that may take. And so long as she was not confirmed to be dead, Doug clung to the hope that she was still alive.

* * *

In hindsight, leaving Doug unsupervised wasn't her best decision. She'd made sure he couldn't escape again, though. Any attempts at accessing a panel would lock it down before it fully extended. The gap between panel and wall wouldn't leave enough space for him to crawl through again.

She stepped into one of her own elevators, tucked away within the depths of her wing. There _were_ other ways to access Old Aperture, and Doug had been an idiot to believe otherwise.

She had to go back down there and double check that chamber. Her audio feed couldn't confirm anything, and she had to be _absolutely_ sure that that the splash she heard had come from Chell herself.

The familiar ride dragged along, letting questions bounce around her head.

What was she doing?

The damage had already been done to her—she couldn't reverse that now. She couldn't gain any new data from testing the two, and even watching their responses to her comments wasn't helpful. None of this was for science.

At this point, it was just revenge.

* * *

She blinked. The doors opened and Caroline moved through the familiar areas until the reached the 1960's test chamber control room.

_Click._

She stuck a fingernail beneath a switch and flipped, disengaging the testing track's lockdown. If she wanted to investigate that area herself she needed to be able to open the door.

She moved through the back areas of the enrichment spheres, easily dropping in to the second test's entrance. The door slid open as she approached. and f

For a split second she hoped to see Chell sprint through the door, ready to fight her way past Caroline—but nothing happened.

Caroline wrapped a hand around the doorframe, a motion similar to holding back the automatic doors of an elevator. She leaned in and scanned the room.

Nothing.

An unengaged button sat beside the exit. A cube lingered up on that high ledge, untouched. White surfaces mixed with dark ones, creating a patched-together mosaic of a chamber. She looked and she listened, glancing over every possible area, every possible hiding spot but seeing no one.

Well, that confirmed it. She was gone.

Caroline exhaled. There was no test subject in this chamber, no more girl to worry about. Now, she just had to break the news to her other test subject upstairs.

* * *

_WhoOooOoooOOOOOooOoooOoo._

Doug slammed into the ground, air rushing from his lungs. His companion cube sat on a ledge behind him, holding open one door while he crouched on a button to hold the other. The high-energy pellet hissed by his ear, giving a slight click as it hit the receptacle at the far end of the room.

He pushed himself to his feet and then retrieved his cube.

Three platforms needed to be raised, and in Caroline's absence he'd activated all three. The complexity of the test, along with Caroline's absence, had been enough to quell his growing dread.

He portaled back to the main chamber's ledge—the one he'd walked in from. Three stationary platforms sat in place, raised high above the chamber floor.

The scientist exhaled.

A sizeable gap stretched between each stationary scaffolding, and he realized he wouldn't be able to just hop across. He'd slip through the cracks if he didn't get a running start.

Doug backed up until his heels touched the platform's border, and then sprinted forward and leaped. The soft glowing hearts of the cube partially blocked his vision, but as he landed the gun's energy field kept it suspended.

Well, at least he knew his modification worked correctly.

He backed up and leaped again, footsteps soft on the hard plastic platforms. A hallway extended to his right, and just he gave one last nervous jump her dreaded voice came back on.

"Well, I'm back. You've actually made progress since I left," she said, voice flatter than usual. "I'll admit that this test was patched together, but it just fits your situation so perfectly."

As Doug moved down the new hallway with his companion, he glanced up and frowned.

"Your faithful companion has proved to be nothing but loyal, keeping you out of harm's way and helping you as it accompanied you through this chamber. Does this situation sound a bit familiar to you? You've had plenty of time to think it over," she said.

Doug's eyes widened. "What are you saying—"

"I needed to repeat the experiment, of course, to make sure your actions would be consistent in both scenarios. It wouldn't be science otherwise," she said. "But what I'm saying—and what you've been too dense to realize—is that that cube is meant to act as a placeholder for someone. Another faithful companion of yours," she said. "I'll let you piece together just _who_ that might be."

Doug's stomach twisted.

The cube was Chell.

His heartbeat quickened.

The cube was _Chell_ and he'd been so focused on the chamber itself that he hadn't even made the connection as he carted along the now beat-up box. He'd tried to keep it unscathed, but burn marks dotted the sides much like Chell's cuts that she'd gotten during their escape.

He dropped the cube onto a red button. A chamberlock twisted. Behind a glass pane, Doug spotted a single button.

"Still, your weighted companion cube brought you some luck—but you of all people know that luck can't last forever," she said. "That _cube_ cannot accompany you through the facility any longer."

Doug got the feeling that Caroline wasn't referring to his box with hearts. "And how do you expect me to do that?" he said.

"Press that button and you'll find out."

He jogged down the steps and pressed his palm against it.

A countdown timer sounded off, ticking steadily.

_Tick tick._

_ Tick tick._

_ Tick tick._

A circular, dark chute hissed open. Reds and oranges coated the chamber, heat swirling out as he ran back to his cube.

"Deposit that cube into the emergency intelligence incinerator," said Caroline.

This wouldn't work on him. He wouldn't let it work—this was just a cube, after all. Just a cube with hearts instead of circles, one that he should have no problem tossing into a fire.

The cube hovered over the incinerator's opening, and the heat made his hands prickle. Colors flashed off of the metallic edges, but Doug wasn't focused on the cube.

Even pressed against the warm edge, Doug couldn't see the bottom of the incinerator. Instead he saw a wavering glow of intense heat, broken only by distinct flames.

His stomach twisted.

It would just take one click to let the cube fall—

—and as Doug imagined it falling, his mind flashed and substituted in Chell. He could only see _her,_ falling farther and farther with a hand desperately stretched up as she hoped for Doug to catch her.

_Click._

The incinerator's aperture closed.

"Your companion cube _must_ be euthanized," said Caroline.

He squeezed his eyes shut, but image burned just as brightly in the dark of his mind. He couldn't let the cube go. He couldn't do it.

"Rest assured that eight out of ten Aperture Science engineers believe the Companion Cube is most likely incapable of feeling much pain," said Caroline. "The process itself _is_ remarkably painful. Still, though. It's nothing compared to the acid."

Doug backpedaled, grabbing the cube and sprinting back toward the main chamber. He tried to ignore her. He tried to ignore what would inevitably come out of her mouth, the words he didn't want to hear—

"It may be the quickest way to go, but it's also the most painful. She didn't even have the strength to scream out before she died," she said. "And I DID go down there and check myself."

Doug's heart jumped—so there _was_ another way down there. He just had to look harder—

"But the chamber's empty," she said, voice flat. "She's dead."

* * *

A sudden, crushing weight hit Doug as if a weighted cube had been thrown into his chest. The air disappeared from his lungs and he inhaled sharply.

No.

It couldn't be true. Caroline had to have been lying to him. She must've closed off the audio feed, she must have been hiding something—

He swallowed.

Chell couldn't be—

Even though he barely think and barely breathe, he weaved through three gleaming metal pillars and back into the main chamber. He needed to get back to that _room,_ and out of her prying eyes to give him a moment of privacy to process what he'd just heard.

Pop.

Thwop.

Two portals opened, and Doug shoved his companion cube through the opening.

"Hold on," said Caroline. "Where do you think you're going?"

Doug shifted his weight to the side, shooting a glance over his shoulder. A red-lens camera twisted, light in the corner blinking as it focused in on him. A surge of anger rose through him and he pulled the gun close to his face, firing again. Sparks hissed as the device clattered to the ground, and Doug pivoted toward another camera.

_Thwop._

Again and again he fired at the cameras, knocking each and every one of them offline. Without those, Caroline was left with nothing but her observation rooms—and she'd have a tough time seeing into that den without those.

His work done, he darted back into the den and disengaged his portals. But before he could take a minute to calm himself down, he grabbed his pen from his pocket and scrawled up a phrase on the wall.

STOP WATCHING

Doug slumped to the ground, pulling his knees close. He steadied himself with several shaky breaths, wiping a sleeve across his eyes. He couldn't allow himself to break down here. Not with _her _so nearby.

Doug bit down on his lip to stop the hot tears welling up in his eyes.

She was dead.

Caroline had confirmed it.

She was as dead as dead could be, a decomposing body in a pit of acid. In a matter of days she'd be reduced to nothing—nothing but a collection of memories. And he had no one to blame but himself.

Doug pressed the heels of his hands into his eye sockets and pushed. He couldn't do it, he couldn't let her see or hear—

The pressure built to an almost unbearable level, letting tears leak out anyways, silent and warm as they slid down his face like droplets on a car window.

He could face turrets. He could suffer through lasers. He could navigate his way across acid and every other deadly testing element. Caroline could throw anything at him in the name of revenge and he could survive.

But Caroline taking it out on Chell hurt him more than anything she could've ever done to him.

When he closed his eyes, he felt her arms wrap around him in a hug. The sensation flung him full-force back into their last conversation, where she'd begged him not to leave and she'd _told _him to stay, but he'd left anyways. He'd clung to that hopeless optimism that a solution was within easy reach, that if h e made it back up to the upper levels he'd figure everything out and that she'd be safe.

He sniffed and wiped his nose.

The realization that he'd never again see Chell hit him, a pain so sharp and biting and overwhelming he felt as if he'd been ambushed by turrets and sprayed with bullets simultaneously.

He'd never again see that stoic concentration, or her slight twitch of an eyebrow as she drug her pencil across paper or a paintbrush across canvas. He'd never sit in the company of her content curiosity, happy to just sit in quietness as she watched him work. And he'd never see that subtle smile of hers when she though no one was watching, and he never again hear her snort of laughter whenever Doug messed something up.

All of that—he'd never see it again.

Doug gave a string of chocked sobs, chest heaving. He pulled his companion cube close and leaned his upper body across it, fingers clinging to the metal edges. Though the hard surface and glowing hearts provided little comfort, they were still better than the cold floors and the cold walls.

The finality of it hit him like a punch in gut, and he couldn't breathe. Doug buried his head in his arms and pressed his hands into the back of his head. He couldn't hold it in any longer and he didn't care if Caroline heard him.

Panicked and overwhelmed, Doug cried.

Hours passed. While steady at first, they began to come in waves, dying down momentarily until an unrelated thought flung him back into grief that felt as fresh as it had been hours ago.

He barely heard it the first time—a calm, gentle voice beneath his sobs that silenced all of the other voices.

_Doug._

His chest hurt and his head hurt and he could barely think through the pain, and yet he was still thinking too much. He wished he could just shut off his brain and forget about what happened. He wished he could just go back in time, to how things had been hours ago before Chell's fall.

_Doug, listen to me._

He jerked his head up from the cool metal, the voice jarring him back into reality. The sound was sudden and unexpected, and yet so familiar that chills went down his spine. There was no mistaking whose voice he heard.

"Why do you have _her_ voice?" he asked, words wavering with accusation and disbelief. _I can't help it. I was meant to represent Chell,_ said the cube. _But listen to me. _

"I can't," said Doug. " I'm sorry. I can't."

It was too raw, too much of a slap in the face to hear her voice come from beneath him, so clear and eerie as if nothing had happened at all.

She was dead, and he didn't understand _why, _or even why she had to die in the first place. There was nothing justified about Caroline's actions. It wasn't brave—it was murder.

The word _why_ repeated itself in his mind, momentarily drowning out the voice of the cube. He pulled out his pen and rose to his feet, scrawling out a red outline of the cube, his friend, his companion. With a few quick slashes he filled in the empty middle—where a heart should be, still beating and alive—with a skull and crossbones.

He repeated the phrase over and over and over, red words wrapping around the cube drawing.

Why why why

why why why

why why

why why why

why why why why why why why

? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?

Why did this have to happen why did she die why why why—

Caroline's voice cut him off, speakers crinkling in the other room.

Doug heard the speakers crinkle on in the other room.

"Who are you talking to back there?" said Caroline, her voice genuinely curious. "I know it's not me."

Doug said nothing.

"I'm sure your schizophrenia's to blame, but still. That voice you're hearing is in your head and is _not_ coming from that cube."

Doug frowned. Of course that voice was coming from the cube. Where else could it be coming from?

"You're delusional and hallucination and seeing an inanimate object as alive. I'm adding these things to your file, by the way. If you were better at taking care of your companions this might not be happening."

_Don't listen to her, _the cube said faintly. More words and phrases returned, swirling around his mind and he needed them_ out_ of his mind and onto the panels.

"Don't worry," he said. "I won't." He picked another panel and started scrawling.

The vital apparatus vent will deliver

Oh it will

WILL

The weighted companion cube DOES speak.

Superstition, perceiving inanimate objects as alive, and hallucinations. I'm not hallucinating. You are.

Considering the events of these past few days—and how many events Henry had been willing to pass off as a wild hallucination—he knew that this voice couldn't be more real, and no one could convince him otherwise.

Besides, other Aperture products, like the turrets and the personality sphere had the ability to speak. This companion cube was no different.

_Doug._

He heard the voice again, soft and gentle as if an angel had descended and softly touched him on the shoulder.

"What?" he said.

_ It's going to be okay. _

"Seems to me like you're taking this representation of Chell a bit too serious,'" said Caroline. "While I did want you to take care of the cube, I must also advise you to ignore its advice. Weighted companion cubes _cannot_ speak."

Doug continued his writing on the walls, listening to Caroline's words and then morphing them into a jumbled and frantic answer. He began writing the word Companion Cube in alternating shades of black and red.

COMPANION CUBE

You said to take care of it.

How can I?

You won't let me.

I should disregard your advice.

Leave me alone!

"Really, though. I'm getting tired of this. You've been in that room for hours and you can't stay there forever. Eventually you'll have to come out."

The words sent another chill through both him and Caroline. She couldn't help but notice how similar those words were to the ones she'd spoken about Chell. Both she and Doug had hidden from her—but neither one could stay hidden.

His mind kept confusing the cube and Chell, until they were almost inseparable from one another. He moved to the side and started on another panel.

Because I could not stop

For Death,

He kindly stopped for me

The cube had food and

Maybe ammo

And immortality.

Chell had everything she could have needed. That place in Old Aperture could sustain her for a long time, considering the shelves upon shelves of food and water. The supplies wouldn't keep her alive forever, but close enough.

And they had found their ammo; their one weapon to use against Caroline had come from the mouth of dead company owner himself.

He sunk back to the ground. "What am I supposed to do now?" he said, keeping his voice as low as possible.

_Move on,_ said the Cube._ You will have plenty of time to mourn her later. But you've got to get out of here._

Doug leaned his forehead against the wall, one black hand pressed against it. The cube slipped from words into a comforting tune, as if it was an oversized music box rather than a testing cube.

"Just give me a minute," said Doug. "Let me draw one last thing."

With a deep breath, he lifted his pen. He wanted to draw a figure of Chell, but the mere act of calling up her image in his mind dragged up memories like a stick stirring up mud in water.

He couldn't do it.

Instead he sketched out the shape of his other companion, unable to even attempt to draw Chell. It was almost as if sketching her out with give some sort of finality to this, as if drawing her as an angel would seal her fate the same way Caroline had sealed the chambers.

His hand swooped to the side, leaving black ink wings extending from the companion cube. He circled the ink above into a swirling halo.

Another phrase rose up in his mind, vaguely poetic in comparison to the other phrases he'd heard. Doug glanced down at the cube, and the humming stopped.

_Say it_, said the cube. _I know you're thinking of it._

"You're going to die too, aren't you?" he said, voice resigned. While he was calm now, the overwhelming sense of sadness lingered just out of sight. One small motion, one wrong word could let it all flood back in. He wasn't sure how much longer he could hold it back.

_She's gone, Doug. And I will be too soon_, said the cube.

"Don't say that," he said. "I can't let you die too."

_But I'm slowing you down. You need to move forward, and I would rather die in that fire than be a burden to you_, said the cube.

Chell was gone, and soon enough the cube left behind to represent her would be gone as well.

His pen hovered for a long moment before Doug let it glide across the textured surface.

Not in cruelty,

Not in wrath,

The Reaper came today;

An Angel visited

This gray path,

And took the cube away.

He paused, inspecting the panels before scrawling one last word in red.

R.I.P.

_Goodbye, Chell._

His chest heaved again, and Doug took a few deep breaths and pinched the bridge of his nose. The cube was right. All he had to do was hold it together for a few more chambers, and maybe he'd finally be out of this place.

He lifted his knocked-over portal device, one hand sliding around the handle and other resting beneath the gun's middle. The device whirred out of its sleep mode with a jolt. He fired twice, portals linking and tearing open a pathway out of this small den.

* * *

_Click._

The button sunk as it accepted the weight of the cube. The doors slid open again. Doug rested a hand on the cube's top.

"You're sure about this?" said Doug.

_Yes. Keep going—you're almost done._

This time, he detected a mechanical undertone to the voice that sounded so much like Chell's.

"She said it might hurt," said Doug.

_It will,_ said the cube. _But that's okay. Don't let me stop you now.  
_

Doug gave a heavy, defeated sigh. His shoulders slumped and his face sunk as if he hadn't slept in days. And yet he was struck with a sense of gratitude toward this box—he hadn't known before that cubes could speak, and that the voice of one could drive away the other voices he heard like a floodlight in a dark room.

He gave it a small pat before trudging down the stairs. He activated the incinerator's timer and then ran back, heaving up the cube and taking it to the incinerator.

The countdown clicked, a constant reminder as the cube hovered over the edge. Waves of heat made it look as it was wavering.

_Goodbye, Doug,_ said the cube. _I'll see you again someday._

"Goodbye," said Doug, almost a whisper. He couldn't stop; he couldn't let himself think too much or he'd never be able to go through with it.

_Click._

The gun disengaged, and the cube slipped into the flames. He closed his eyes and the image of Chell flashed back in, again, desperately reaching out to him as she fell to her death.

The incinerator slipped closed. Doug backpedaled.

"Once again, you led your faithful companion right to her death," said Caroline. "Congratulations."

Doug said nothing for a moment, leaning against the wall and summoning as much control as he could muster.

"Watching her die like that," he said coldly. "Was it worth it?"

A slight pause.

"You know I couldn't let her live."

"You didn't answer my question," said Doug. "Was it worth it?"

Caroline's voice wavered. "I did this for the good of _all_ of us," she said.

"But was it _worth it?"_ Doug yelled, the echo bouncing through the chamber and dissipating.

Caroline drew back in her seat at his unexpected rise in volume, glad for once he'd moved out of view from her window.

The silence stretched between them, and an unreadable expression passed over her face.

"No," she eventually said. "It wasn't."


	16. Tenacity

Chapter 16 - Tenacity

Chell's toes jutted over the dizzying drop.

She stared at the white island in the sea of acid for a long moment before her vertigo leaped into focus.

"You've brought this upon yourself. And now you're trapped there," said Caroline, voice hissing through the speakers.

The girl backpedaled. And though she remained silent, she couldn't deny the truth to the woman's words. Just like there hadn't been a way out of her relaxation vault, there wasn't a way out of this test chamber either. Both entrance and exit remained locked. She'd already circled the room twice, feeling at the seams for cracks and imperfections and instead meeting a tightly-knit wall.

But her time waiting in that vault _had_ taught her one thing: even when things looked bleak, there was always a way out.

And while technically the acid could be a 'way out,' Chell immediately dismissed that thought.

She would never give up. _Ever. _

Still, Chell sunk to her feet and dug her chin into her knees. She stared at her shoes, focusing in on the dark scuffs staining the sides and the once-white shoelaces now frayed and grayed.

Chell flexed her ankles and hard plastic dug into her Achilles tendons. With a frown she pried off both shoes and set them aside. During her escape she'd had a valid reason to just shove them on, but she'd had enough time to put them on correctly before leaving her hideout. Instead, she'd just shoved them on like before.

She tugged up her socks and wiggled her shoes back on, making sure the heel supports didn't cave in again.

_Skrick._

Chell yanked her laces tight, eyelets squeaking. She pulled down her sweatpant legs and pressed a hand on the floor behind her for support. Her fingers curled around the cool, rusty edges of a metal grating.

It sunk into the floor slightly behind her, a tiny square in the patchwork flooring. Unlike the uniform walls and the uniform ceiling, the floor of the chamber looked as if the builders had simply slapped it together from scraps of other projects.

And right behind her—no bigger than an average air-duct entrance—sat a metal _grating. _

Chell scrambled onto her stomach and leaned over the grating. The direct overhead lighting cast a head-sized shadow through the gap in the floor, obscuring what little she could see of the area beneath the chamber. She scooted back, nose almost touching the edge.

Looking through the checkered window was like examining a dark room with a stationary flashlight. The lights only illuminated a square directly beneath her, the rest obscured in a dark blur.

Chell blinked.

She shielded her eyes with her hands and leaned closer. A few silver ducts reflected dying light, and the faint outline of a building's rooftop shifted into focus.

A building. She was directly above a building.

It couldn't be more than ten or fifteen feet beneath this chamber floor. She'd been right—this test _wasn't _contained by a sphere. But the grating itself sat along the edge of this new building—had it been a few feet to the right, she'd be directly over acid.

* * *

_Clang._

Chell's legs quivered as she slammed both feet onto the floor. The sound echoed, and a split-second later that familiar voice came on.

"Are you doing what I think you're doing?" said Caroline,

Chell staggered, then took her words as encouragement. She sprinted forward, angling her feet in and kicking as hard as she could against the grating.

"You stop that."

The metal webbing dented inwards—she'd already taken out the four screws anchoring it in.

"You can't break down that exit with your bare hands, you know. It's metal."

Oh, she wasn't breaking down the chamber exit—well, in a way she was. She was just making her own exit rather than using the designated one.

_Bang._

"If you're trying to beat yourself, I won't interfere. But if death is what you want—and it's inevitable, really—there's a much more painless method in that chamber. In fact, all of the other people who failed that chamber died by it. I'm sure it won't take you long to figure out," she said. "The acid really is the way to go."

Chell only smiled—she'd already briefly considered and rejected _that_ idea.

Her chest rose and fell, and she wiped a hand across her forehead. Her nails tingled, jagged after she'd used them as makeshift tools to jam into screws and twist. Nine out of ten fingernails had snapped—but on the bright side, she'd managed to unscrew all four anchoring corners. She pressed a finger into her mouth and bit at a broken nail.

Shoulder muscles strained and groaned as she pulled at the grate. The heavy metal lifted a quarter inch then stuck. The design didn't allow it to be removed from the chamber's interior.

The grate crashed back into place.

Chell rose to her feet, bouncing on her toes. She couldn't just pull up the metal and set it aside—she'd have to knock it through from up here. But already the metal warped downwards as if someone had pinched a cloth napkin's center and pulled. A few more kicks and it would bend enough to cave in altogether.

She was _so _close—she wasn't about to give up now.

_Bang._

Her knees trembled. Chell backed across the chamber, giving herself a running start and then slammed her feet into the floor with as much strength as she could muster.

BANG.

The left edge lurched beneath her, swinging down before vanishing into empty space.

A loud, echoing _CRACK._

The mangled grating clattered against the lower building's roof for a split-second before skittering off the edge.

. . . _Splash._

She lost her footing and her stomach lurched as she slipped through the opening. Her right arm flung out, struggling to grab onto anything but instead grasped at air.

_Snap._

Her wrist cracked flat beneath her, absorbing the brunt of her fall. Tears welled in her eyes as the pain crackled to life like a dry log in a campfire. Chell inhaled sharply, and then curled onto her side.

She closed her eyes. Focusing on anything other than pain was next to impossible—it jabbed into her first like dull needles, then like sharpened blades.

Caroline's voice cut off as soon as the grate splashed into the acid—but Chell didn't notice.

A grimace darkened her face, and Chell clenched her teeth. Carefully she edged her right hand toward her chest and just cradled it there, hardly daring to breathe. One wrong move would make it flare to an unbearable level.

Minutes passed, and Chell refused to move. Her brain nagged at her to push it aside and get up and find a way off of this ceiling she'd landed on—going back into that chamber wasn't an option any longer.

The test shaft rattled, a low and rumbling sound that shook the buildings above her. Flecks of dust and debris rained down, and Chell cupped her left hand over her mouth. This movement—she'd felt the exact same thing when the lockdown had been initiated.

She hardly dared to hope that Caroline had reversed it.

It wasn't as if she could suddenly solve that chamber—that was impossible without a portal device, after all. But so long as the lockdown was disengaged, this meant she could navigate the hallways and doorways. She might have a shot at getting out of here.

_Whoosh._

She gave a sigh of relief and then froze.

The door in the chamber above her slid open and Chell heard soft footsteps. A figure took a half-step into the room, face illuminated by the chamber lighting. Chell couldn't see, but she knew it was _her._

Her breath shook.

She fought back the urge to scream and scramble away from her position on the floor, desperate to get _away_ from her, but didn't. Any sudden sound or movement would alert Caroline to her presence—and one glance down the empty space where the grating used to be and she'd see Chell glaring right back up her.

She held her breath as she shifted into a crouch, motions slow and deliberate. She edged out of the square of light, neck craning upward and barely able to see out.

Caroline stared across the chamber, checking the ceiling and the walls and the acid but never once examined the floor. Instead she gazed out with an expression Chell couldn't place. It wasn't anger; it wasn't joy. The woman gave the doorframe a small pat and turned away, and the expression clicked.

Caroline looked—dare she say it—_disappointed_.

The doors hissed closed, and even after fifteen minutes passed Chell's body still trembled.

* * *

_Thunk._

Chell landed softly near the room's entrance. The drop from ceiling to walkway hadn't been nearly as large as the gap between chamber floor and building roof—and whatever this structure was, it _wasn't_ a test chamber.

Instead of investigating the room, though, she turned on her heels and marched down the in the other direction. There was no way she'd head back toward the testing chambers she'd just escaped.

Every step she took was a painful, relentless reminder. She needed to find a bandage or brace or _something_ to help stabilize her most-likely-broken wrist. Yet she continued at a brisk pace, pathway passing through a stone tunnel before morphing into a catwalk suspended over swaying spheres.

The walkway ended at another elevator shaft, but Chell took the twisting staircase that brought her closer to the acid lake. A stone walkway connected her to a sliding glass door built into a rock face. Chell slipped inside, wrist still pressed close.

This was the most out-of-place room she'd ever seen in Aperture.

Plush chairs and ash-trays littered the room. The smell of cigarette smoke and ancient dust clung to the walls and carpet, stirring to life as she edged into the adjoining room.

Rows of typewriters sat on rows of desks, long since abandoned by their former users. Chell darted for the desks—if they'd left behind those bulky machines, she hung on to the hope that they had left behind other, more useful objects.

She threw open every drawer, sifting through broken pencils and dried-out pens and crumpled papers until her fingers brushed against a slick metal casing. Chell's eyes widened as she yanked at the handle and slid it onto the desk.

Patches of silver shone through chipping white paint, and bright red cross across the top and bottom cleared up any doubt about what this tin held.

She'd found a first-aid kit.

Chell fumbled at the clasps with her non-dominant hand and gingerly lifted the top. The same musty smell—like rotting books—rose from the kit, and she coughed once. She reached in and spread out the kit's contents onto the table: half-empty pill bottles, a string of band-aids, a thick cloth bandage, and a few strips of gauze.

Immediately she downed a what she hoped were a few painkillers, and then grasped at the yellowed bandage. Her teeth clamped onto one end as she used her free hand to unroll it, letting it twist out like a flattened snake. After slipping into a desk chair, Chell propped her right elbow against the desk and straightened out her wrist. She wasn't going to find a real brace or a real cast down here—she knew Aperture's views on health and safety. This half-empty kit was a miracle in itself.

Again and again she tightly wrapped the bandage around her broken wrist, beginning beneath the knobby part and then rising up and across her palm before returning to circling up and down her wrist until the bandage ran out.

She tried to flex her wrist but it didn't budge—_good._ She'd done a decent job, and her fingers barely jerked forward when she flexed them. Well, at least she knew those still worked.

Without medical attention, her wrist would never completely heal. But her makeshift brace might at least alleviate some of the pain.

After pocketing the remaining supplies, Chell slipped back into the main lounge and collapsed into a plush chair. She gave a long and happy sigh as she sank in. This was the most comfortable she'd been in a long while, and she felt as if she could stay there for years.

An hour ago, she wasn't sure if she could make it out of that test alive. And now here she was—relaxing in a chair and nursing a broken wrist, but completely alive.

She would've laughed with relief had she not been so terrified inside. She'd squeezed her way out of there, but she had no idea what to do next.

The chair enveloped her further, and Chell relaxed and stared up at the circular light fixtures that mimicked the dangling enrichment spheres. She tiled her head back and stared over at the two display cases bolted to the walls. On the right, she saw trophies and awards and what looked like a framed newspaper article in the back corner. A portrait of a young Cave Johnson hung between the displays, and Chell realized with a start that she'd never seen the man's face before. Those features, that expression—they suited him, just like his voice.

Her attention drifted to the last display case, and Chell took one at the contents before jumping to her feet and bolting forward.

She pressed her face close to the glass and a dark, box-sized device hung behind the glass. A small, shining plaque sat beneath it: Aperture Science Quantum Tunneling Device.

Chell breathed, then gave a small squeal and jump of delight.

That was _it, _right there behind the glass. She'd found the device she so desperately needed, even if it looked more like a cross between an overgrown leaf blower and something out of a Ghostbusters movie than an actual portal device. So many portal-friendly surfaces dotted Old Aperture—and if she acquired that device, she could go anywhere.

Her fingers trailed along the glass edges as she searched for a latch or lever, but instead she found a lock and empty keyhole.

Fantastic.

She should've known this was too good to be true; there was always a flaw in the plan. Sifting through that office had been difficult enough, and searching through it again for a tiny key would be next to impossible.

_Hold on._

Chell took a step back and almost snorted with laughter. Since when she did she need a key to get into a glass case? She'd already caused enough destruction in Aperture—one more glass panel wouldn't stop her now.

Gray flakes rained down as she lifted up an ashtray. Her right hand barely hovered over the tip—there for balance more than support. Chell hefted the pole like a baseball bat and swung it in a wide and wobbly arc. The edge shattered through the glass just like Wheatley had crashed through that observation window.

Glass tinkled on the carpet. Chell kicked away the lingering shards then one-handedly edged the machine through the jagged hole. The device clacked as it dropped onto the floor and tilted onto its side.

Little fans and cords extended from the rectangular section—no doubt the part that housed the device's power system A large tube extended from one side of the device and connected to the operational end of the device.

She searched the bottom edge for some sort of power switch, but instead found a study cord attached to a dangling handle.

Okay—so powering up this thing wouldn't be as easy as flipping a switch.

Chell readjusted her position and planted her feet, left hand closing around the handle. Her arm jerked to the side as she revved up the device.

_Click-click-click._

Her shoulders ached and her right wrist screamed in protest, but with each pull she felt the device edge closer and closer to starting. Chell yanked harder, grimacing.

_Click-click-click-click. _

The tunneling device sputtered, a puff of smoke drifting through the air. Chell shifted on her feet again and pulled so hard her arm popped.

_Click-click-click-whirrrr._

The tube rattled against the floor as the device roared to life. Chell gave a small, relived smile and then shrugged on the harness like an oversized backpack. Slipping on the left strap was easy enough, but slipping her right wrist through the other strap without bumping anything was like constantly scraping against the metal walls in a game of Operation.

She snapped a buckle in the front, then staggered forward at the unexpected weight of the Quantum Tunneling Device. Hard straps bit into her shoulders, and the box hummed and rattled against her spine. Chell rolled her shoulders and shifted the operational tube to her left hand.

Her fingers hit a single trigger. Her face darkened. Strange—while this was clearly a dual portal device, she only felt one button. The portal guns sitting in Doug's office continued multiple switches—a trigger for each portal, and one for the energy-manipulator.

She glanced at the handle of the device, noticing a single sliding ring that circled around the 'handle' of the device. After pulling out her hand, Chell sat herself on the ground and propped the device's end between her knees.

With her non-dominant hand she twisted the notched ring to the right and let it click into place. If she squinted she could make out the word 'two' scrawled out in tiny lettering. The device lurched beneath her as she twisted it back to 'one.' It made enough sense—two notches for two portals.

Now she just had to test it out on a portal-friendly surface.

Chell pushed herself to her feet and moved through a doorway on the far left. Cave Johnson's voice roared to life with a tiny click of a speaker.

"Welcome, gentlemen, to Aperture Science! Astronauts, war heroes, Olympians—you're here because we want the best, and you are it. So: Who's ready to make some science?"

"I am!"

Chell's blood ran cold.

That voice—it was _her_ voice, no doubt about it. Chell twisted inside at her optimism—she sounded to bright and cheerful and ready to take the world by storm. Those two words made her seem so undeniably _happy._

It made Chell sick to wonder what sort of events could have caused such a drastic transformation in the woman.

Either way, she'd had enough of this place. Diving deeper into Aperture's past was something she could do another day. For now, she needed to head in the opposite direction and return to her room behind the _Borealis._

She'd never meant to leave that safe haven, after all—and as long as she made it back there, Chell knew Doug would come back and sneak her up to the surface. There was no possible way he could know about her scrape with death and how she'd barely managed to scrape out of that test chamber with her life.

She could tell him that later, though—after they'd both made it to safety. For now she needed to concentrate on worming her way back to that room.

But the only direct path was through the testing track she'd just escaped.

* * *

A/N: Just a short chapter to say that Chell's 'okay' and now has the Quantum Tunneling Device. A quick note, though—if you look in the 50's section of Old Aperture, there really is a broken display case and a knocked-over ash tray. And also, in my mental layout of that place I put the 60's testing track on the far side of the acid lake.

And oh! I've been meaning to mention this, but if you're on tumblr and feel like following me there, my url is silverstreams dot tumblr dot com.


	17. Not a Moron

Chapter 17 - Not a Moron

Chell shivered.

The farther she descended, the colder the temperature grew—and as the year edged toward winter, it could only get worse. A chilly breeze brushed at her, raising the hairs on her skin.

As Chell rubbed her arms, she wished for her sweatshirt. She really should've taken that split-second to grab it instead of leaving it wadded up and forgotten on the floor in the science fair hall.

At least she'd be back in that sheltered hideout soon enough. Even though Doug told her that every level of Aperture contained a stash of food, she didn't know where else to find it besides the room she'd already been in. And with her luck she'd get herself hopelessly lost if she tried to find another one.

She had to get back there—but the only path she knew was through the testing track she'd just escaped.

It couldn't be _that_ difficult.

She'd made it through the first chamber without a portal device. She'd figured out the solution to the second test chamber within moments. The remaining chambers should be simple enough as long as she had the Quantum Tunneling Device.

The device clanged against her back in a soft, rhythmic pattern like a slightly-more-painful heartbeat as she moved along the walkway. Another door slid open at the hallway's end, revealing a spacious room.

Comfortable chairs lined the walls, accented by dark shelving and little hooks for stowing belongings. This room was as plush as the 50's entrance she'd just come from—though Chell wasn't sure why a room like this sat beneath a testing track.

A worn banner stretched across the opposing wall, one edge fallen onto the ground. Chell picked up the end and took a few steps back, stretching it out and craning her neck to read faded lettering.

Welcome Back Test Subjects!

A pre-recorded message flared to life before she could finish mouthing the words.

"In case one of those _lazy_ test associates hasn't flagged you down yet," he growled, "you're going to want to take an immediate left. We've got a brand-new invention here that our engineers like to call the Advanced Knee Replacement. All you've gotta do it let us clamp the device on over your kneecaps and you'll be set. It's relatively painless—or so I'm told," he said with a slight laugh. "The heel springs should allow you to fall a considerable distance without feeling too much debilitating pain. Careful, though. We're not quite sure _how_ far you can fall yet. We'll figure it out soon enough. Just be sure you attach them properly—if not, you're going to be in a world of pain when you land. Heh."

Chell took an immediate left into a similar room. Rows and rows of heel springs completely covered the left wall. Paper tags dangled from each pair, listing off measurements in a mixture of letters and numbers meant absolutely nothing to Chell. She felt as if she were lost in a foreign shoe store, wanting to try on a cute pair of shoes but unable to decipher any labels. Chell shrugged the Quantum Tunneling Device from her shoulders and flipped a switch to power it down.

She might be here for a while.

After rolling her dark sweatpants above her knees, she dragged a step-stool to the end of the line and stretched up on her toes. She pulled down each pair and measured them against her leg, though the vast majority extended far past her feet—more like stilts than leg supports.

These were intended for grown men, after all. Not twelve-year-old girls.

She moved farther down the line and the gap between heel and heel springs shrunk until she hit the smallest pair she could find. Though still a bit large, they'd manage. It wasn't like she planned on keeping them on for more than a few days.

She didn't want to put them on—once locked in, they'd require outside help to remove—but she didn't have a choice. She needed them if she was going to survive this testing track.

Chell took a deep breath and positioned half of the device in front of her kneecap, and pressed the back portion into the crook of skin behind her knee. She braced her leg against the desk and pushed, hard. A sliver of skin caught between, and pain flashed up. Chell immediately released, wincing.

She readjusted the pieces and then pushed harder and harder, pressure growing as if someone had wrapped their hands around her knee and squeezed.

_Click. _

The pressure lifted as the pieces latched into place. Chell took a moment brief moment to stretch out her foot, then moved on to her right leg. She repeated the process, face twisting until it clicked into place.

Perfect.

Chell took a few experimental steps and stumbled, not at all used to her weight being shifted so far forward. She wasn't used to walking like a ballerina en pointe; she'd never taken a dance class in her life. The only sport she'd ever tried—and been decent at— was gymnastics, and even then she hadn't had to walk on her toes.

As she shifted on her heels, she noticed a doorway labeled 'Fitting Test.'

Well, at least Aperture tried to make sure the fall devices worked properly before testing began. She stepped in and onto a ledge, expecting to find a complex test but only seeing a pit the size of an average bathroom. A blue substance dripped from an overhead vent and splattered onto the blue-stained panels at the bottom.

"With the help of our repulsion gel, this test should be no skin off your back. Just go on and jump down there. If they're on right, you'll bounce back with no problem. If they're not on right, you'll still bounce back—that's what the gel _does_, after all—but you'll just be in a considerable amount of pain. You'll know right away if the braces aren't working. Let's hope they work," said Cave's recording.

Chell paused at the edge then leaped, dropping through the air. She rebounded effortlessly like a tennis ball off concrete, then twisting back up toward the ceiling. The blue goo combined with the Advanced Knee Replacements made jumping and rebounding effortless—not to mention painless. This room was a trampoline. A giant, elaborate trampoline made purely of science.

A smile broke out on her face. For once, she couldn't be happier.

She aligned her feet and let herself freefall then bounce again. Though she was positive the fall devices worked properly— and she would've known if they weren't—landing incorrectly could still damage her legs.

With each successful bounce and fall her smile stretched wider and wider. A few bounces later her confidence rose high enough that she attempted a front flip, twirling high through the air like an Olympic diver before untwisting and rebounding.

The exhilaration of falling and flying in alternating cycles made her burst out laughing, a high and carefree sound so unlike her typical silence. She flipped again and again, twirling and smiling until her face hurt from the sheer joy of it.

The laughter continued until tears streamed down her face and her sides hurt and she couldn't breathe simply because _she couldn't stop_ _laughing._

It had been months since she felt this happy—so carefree and confident as if she could take on the world.

Oh, man, If only Doug could see her now.

The laughs eventually faded away as reality twisted back into focus. She couldn't let a moment of fun distract her from the seriousness of her situation.

On her next jump she landed neatly on the ledge, then exited the test subject waiting room altogether. The path forked a ways ahead, and a sense of familiarity overcame Chell.

This was it—this was the hallway she'd sprinted down to get away from Caroline, and the hallway that had lead her to the testing track in the first place.

She took off to the right, hardly daring to hope that the hallway's entrance remained unlocked like it had been earlier.

Chell threw her shoulder into the door, teeth clacking at the impact.

_Thump._

The door didn't budge. Chell tried again.

_Thump._

No movement.

Well, it'd been worth a shot—even if the jarring collision against the door sent another burst of excruciating pain through her painkillers she'd taken had only worked half as well as she'd liked—not that she should've hoped for anything else from a pill bottle she'd pulled out of a dusty desk.

In hindsight, she was surprised she wasn't on the ground puking from a reaction.

She should've known better than to get her hopes up.

That door wasn't just going to swing open, and she'd been stupid to think Caroline would've overlooked something like that. Chell sighed and leaned her forehead against the cool wall before turning away.

She trudged forward, metal heel springs scraped against the ground. Silent travel in Aperture had become impossible for her with the addition of both the bulky tunneling device and the Advanced Knee Replacements. Every so often she stumbled over an untied shoelace, forcing the heel spring to jerk forward and jab against the arch of her foot.

If she wasn't so worried about getting tetanus, she would've just gone barefoot.

A familiar green sign directed her to the testing track's entrance.

She bounced with every step, enjoying the effortless movements. She might as well have a bit of fun with these new 'shoes'—though she wasn't sure what bouncing around on experimental equipment while stranded in the depths of the science facility said about her idea of fun.

_Besides,_ she thought as she stepped into the first chamber. _The real fun's about to begin._

* * *

The gate slid shut, the motion silent and yet more terrifying than before.

With no test associate to come down and manually reset it, the chamber remained solved and Chell immediately noticed the ajar exit. Helpful. Not that this test had been difficult, though.

Chell moved on to the next test, hesitating before creeping back into the test chamber she'd just broken out of. She kept her steps light and hardly dared to breathe. Even though she knew Caroline would've made her presence known _if_ she was still listening in, Chell couldn't shake the feeling that the speaker could click on at any moment.

The anticipation was worse than her voice itself.

But Caroline couldn't tear her down now—she had Advanced Knee Replacements clamped to her legs _and _a Quantum Tunneling Device strapped to her back_._ And while she assumed the portal device itself was functional, she hadn't _actually _tested it out yet. Not her brightest idea in hindsight.

If all else failed, at least she could escape again through that gap in the floor.

Not that she'd need to do that again. With these two devices, she would be unstoppable.

* * *

Silence reigned the next elevator ride. Unease and tension hung in the air.

Neither Doug nor Caroline spoke a word about what had happened.

The door hissed open, and Doug flicked a switched and his handheld portal device flickered to life. The sign down the hallway buzzed and flashed up the chamber's hazards.

18/19

Two more. There were only two more tests—this one and the next—until he could get out this place. As soon as he finished this testing track, he was going to quit his job and march out of here and never return.

The chamber floor dropped off and dipped into acid, then reappeared on the opposite side of the area. Doug took a few steps and frowned. The only portal panels besides the ones on the wall next to him were on the far side of the room—on the ceiling.

He sighed, then placed his portals. Hopefully the fall wouldn't be too painful.

Before he could step through, Caroline's voice jutted in.

"Well, that's it for me," she said, voice flatter than usual. "I've got a birthday party to go to. Have fun completing this test. And good luck," she said softly.

The speaker clicked off, the sound itself more prominent and audible, as if she'd powered down the device instead of lifting her finger from the record button.

Well, at least she wouldn't be around for a while. If he hurried he might even complete the testing track before her return.

Doug slipped through the portals, cradling the device and failing midair. He crash-landed, shoes skidding beneath him. The scientist took a long moment to make sure nothing was broken before moving. One at a time, he jabbed out his feet and rolled his ankles. Not sprained, surprisingly enough—though he couldn't keep this up for much longer. If he had to keep falling from the ceiling that that, eventually he'd slip up and break a leg.

He turned to look at the rest of chamber and was struck buy just how _huge _this test was. Acid coated the floor beneath every drop—and an unreasonable amount of portal-friendly surfaces were plastered on the ever-rising ceiling.

One more look at it became clear: Doug wouldn't be able to solve this test _and_ leave this place alive.

He slowly rose to his feet, barely noticing as a voice hissed to his left.

"Hey!"

A moment later, it repeated.

"Hey! Old friend here, just trying to get your attention. I'd stop and listen if I were you," said the familiar voice of the personality sphere.

He twisted, trying to figure out just _where_ that circular robot could be. Dark gray panels to his left rattled and jiggled, as if a person behind them was struggling—without avail— to push them away.

"You're just going to have to push!" said Wheatley. "I can't move those panels myself. I tried, I really did."

Doug's eyes widened, and he edged his way toward a two-square section of the gray wall and pressed both palms against it. He pushed, heart jumping as it skidded like a block of ice. The section above it slid away just as easily, and the scientist couldn't help but feel as if he was playing a life-sized game of Tetris.

As he slid into the room, the robot greeted him and spun in his casing.

"Ah, made it through," he said, raising his lower shutter. "I'll have you know that that was my most complex hack yet. You see those panels over there? The ones you dragged in? Bam. Deactivated all of 'em. All I had to do was pull out those cords," he said, trailing off. Doug glanced over at the huge outlets that stuck out of the wall, half of the plugs still dangling down.

"Okay, so pulling was a bit of an exaggeration," he said, glancing down. "Mostly I just hit them with my handle until they popped loose—I _had _to disconnect them from the main power grid, after all. Otherwise they'd be locked in place. Couldn't have moved them if you wanted to," said Wheatley. Doug gave a small smile, then gave the underside of the robot a pat.

Though this den didn't contain any portal-friendly surfaces, it was far more spacious than the failure of a den in the last chamber. In here, he could actually breathe. A fenced-off square in the center dropped down into acid, and a staircase extended to a rectangular catwalk above. This place didn't look like any side-room that should've been part of a test chamber—it just looked like any other part of Caroline's wing.

But instead of moving toward the stairs, Doug dragged the blocks into the back right corner. He waved over the robot and pulled out his pen.

SHE'S WATCHING YOU

With a scrawl of his red pen he repeated his drawing of the surveillance camera. To the side, he wrote out the word 'BEEP'—the same sound that Caroline's speakers made when the intercom came on.

Wheatley's shutters drew in. "I though she left?"

Doug shook his head. She'd left, but she'd be back soon enough. He sketched the red outline of a birthday cake, bright against the dim walls. A split-second later he drew a circle around it and slashed through it. Even though it was Caroline's birthday, he wouldn't be caught dead eating cake at that party.

Another few posters littered the ground, and Doug slapped them up one at a time.

Not Never but NOW

He wouldn't have to wait forever to get out of this testing track—no, he was getting out of here now, just like the poster said. Not never, but _now._ He leaned down and stuck the other one onto the wall.

Courage is Not

The Absence of Fear

An accurate enough message, he supposed—standing up to Caroline in the last chamber had taken a lot of courage, but he'd been terrified the entire time. And though his resolve had shrunk since that confrontation, he still needed to stay strong and get out of this testing track.

The robot whizzed up his rail and jabbed out his handles. "Aaand this room does, in fact, have an exit!" he said with a small nod. "Hate to interrupt whatever you're doing—just thought I'd, you know, point it out. There's a door in here. Right up those stairs."

He took a few hesitant steps up the staircase, glancing through the slats at the acid pit beneath. Though he wasn't sure _what_ purpose acid served in a back-area like this, he didn't dwell on it.

"You have no idea how hard I worked to find an exit for you. She's got this place on lockdown, seriously," said Wheatley.

He took a few steps toward a standard gray door, expecting to jiggle the handle and find it locked. Instead, it stood slightly ajar.

Once again, Wheatley had done something right. That little robot had done it—he'd found another way out of the test chamber.

Henry had been wrong—this robot, from what he'd seen, was far from stupid. He messed things up and yes, he was a bit slow to learn—but for the other scientist to claim that Wheatley didn't posses the _ability_ to learn was ridiculous. The personality sphere was sentient, after all; he had to be able to think on his feet while moving through Aperture.

Though a bit slow at times, he was still far from the moronic robot Henry made him out to be.

Doug swallowed and pushed his way through the door.

He hadn't planned this far ahead.

Up to this point, he'd had a two-part goal: get out of these chambers, and get Chell out of Aperture. But now that he was free, he didn't know what to do next.

He took a deep breath, squeezing his eyes for a moment. Wheatley studied the scientist's face for a long moment before piping up.

"Something, ah, wrong?" he said, voice sincere.

Doug shook his head, and Wheatley couldn't tell if he nodded yes or no.

"Well, we'd best keep moving, then. You know she'll be _livid_ when she comes back. And if you have to go back in that chamber—well, there's a high possibility that you'll die."

He closed the door behind him, then jogged to catch up with the robot. Wheatley wheeled along beside him, happy to continue chatting away. If Doug hadn't been so tired, he might've made an attempt to quiet him down.

"Without those special boots of yours, I don't know how'd you survive those drops. And oho, did you see the rest of the chamber? Turrets. Energy pellets. Acid. She really didn't hold back," he said with a slight laugh. "Not sure what _you_ did to make her angry."

Doug didn't answer, and instead let the robot drift ahead and take the lead until he got more acquainted with his surroundings. Even without Caroline physically being here, the soft red glow and quiet ambiance of this place reminded him so much of her.

"Ooh, and I'll bet you'll never guess what the last chamber ends in," he said, optic darting from left to right as he whizzed onward.

He didn't even bother to wait for Doug's response before continuing.

"An incinerator!" he said with another disbelieving laugh. "It's almost like she doesn't want you to leave that place alive."

Doug shot a glare at the personality sphere. They'd barely managed to break him out of that chamber, and all Wheatley could focus on was _testing_. Typical Aperture.

"Ooh, I just realized—" The robot broke off, optic shrinking to a pinprick. "That's probably the point, innit? A set of impossible yet technically solvable tests hidden away, ending with an incinerator to get rid of, well," he swallowed, "the bodies. Wouldn't want them to just sit there and get progressively smellier. That's what happens to dead humans—they get smelly. Not that I would know from experience," he said. "It's all up here. In my mind."

Doug's stomach churned—what Wheatley said made far too much sense. Caroline had gone to such lengths to hide an entire testing track. Of course no one else would know about it. If the robot was right, then no one would ever make it out alive to tell the tale.

He leaned against the wall, exhaustion creeping in with every exhale of adrenal vapor. Though the robot above him could babble on tirelessly, Doug's tiredness only grew. If today really was Caroline's birthday, then he'd gone longer than he'd thought without resting.

He rubbed at his heavy eyes, blinking to wake himself up. "Hey Wheatley," he said. The robot gave him a fidgety look. "I need you to find someplace I can take a quick nap," he said.

"How about, ah, there?" Wheatley called, and he followed him around a corner. The robot raised a handle and flicked his gaze over to the right.

An air duct sat at the bottom of the wall—a perfect, out-out-view place to duck into. Doug crouched, setting his portal device on the floor before wrapping his fingers through the chilled metal slates.

_Creak._

He pulled, hard_,_ and the entire grate popped off like a bottle cap. The metal grate clanged as he propped it against the wall.

Well—that'd been easier than he'd expected.

Doug picked up his portal device and slid it forward, then hefted himself up into the shiny duct. He crouched at the edge, turning back to the robot.

"Wheatley," he said. The robot's optic widened.

"What? Something wrong?" said the robot, gaze darting. "Ah, I knew I should've picked a better spot. That one's not quality at all. Sorry 'bout that."

"No, it's fine," said Doug, waving a hand dismissively. Though "I just wanted to say thank you."

"Oh," the robot said, momentarily at a loss for words. "I, uh—well, you're welcome. Least I could do," he said with a nervous chuckle. " Had to put all of those hacking skills to use, after all."

neither said it, both of them knew Wheatley had undoubtedly saved the scientist's life. "I'll take it from here," said Doug. "But again, thank you."

"Guess I'll see you later, then," he said. The robot blinked, then watched the man for a split-second longer before rolling away.

As soon as they'd turned the corner, Doug had recognized this area. He didn't need the robot's guidance anymore, at this point his chattering would cause more harm than good.

Besides, he could hardly think straight and all he needed was a quick nap. After that he'd get out of here. He crawled through the duct and slipped into a tight room, stretching out his arms and popping his neck.

Though the ground was slick and hard, Doug bunched up his coat into a makeshift pillow and gave one final jaw-popping yawn before curling up and falling asleep.

* * *

A/N: This chapter is more or less the second half of the previous chapter. It's not a terribly exciting chapter, but I needed to explain a few things.

The Advanced Knee Replacements always seemed like a Old Aperture invention to me. Oh, and the graffiti does stop at Chamber 18, so I figured that Doug must've gotten out there. Otherwise I'm not sure how he would've survived.

Anyways, the next chapter will be focused around Caroline and I am excited to write it.


End file.
